"I still... I still can't get over it. You're here again." Serena said, still glancing over Ash. It was surreal to her. Like at any moment, he would dissapear again, vanishing in front of her.
"You've kept saying, Serena." Miette smiled, her head in her hands, her elbows on the table. "Five times, if you're counting."
Serena went a slight red. "Well, it's true..."
The group had gone to a cafe to catch up once Ash and Serena had left the airport. Ash had been very visually surprised to see Miette, but it had been a pleasant surprise. Miette had given Ash a friendly hug once she saw him, which had Ash returned.
"I'm still surprised you're here, Miette." Ash vocalised, looking at the blue haired trainer.
"Three times." Miette said, counting how many times Ash had said that. "Well, you've been waiting long enough. I'll tell you." She took a sip from her soft drink, before letting out a relaxed sigh. "Nothing too exciting. We kept running into each other, and we got less aggressive and more friendly towards each other. Ran into each other... A few weeks ago, and we were both headed the same way, so we decided to go together. That's about it."
Ash smiled. "Good to know you two haven't been at each other's throats all the time I've been gone."
"We've had the occasional disagreement." Miette smiled.
"That's less surprising." Ash said, smiling amused between the two. He was actually happy the two of them were getting on. He hadn't expected it either, so that was a nice surprise.
"Mostly over a few performance pieces." Serena said, with a smile of her own.
Ash finished the drink he had and let out a sigh. "Still doing the performances?"
Serena nodded. "Yeah. Sylveon has been trying so hard in practice." She looked over to her fairy type Pokemon, whom was playing a sort of game with Ash's Pikachu, evidently having missed the electric type mouse Pokemon as much as she had missed the electric types trainer. The two had always gotten on. As an Eevee, Pikachu seemed to be one of the very few Pokemon it seemed comfortable around, even though it took a while. The others it was comfortable around included Clemonts Bunnelby and Serena herself. That seemed to have passed, mostly, in its evolution. It was still shy, but not cripplingly so anymore.
"Looks like Sylveon has been training hard." Ash agreed. "I'll bet you have too."
"She really has." Miette said with a smile.
"Well... I have uh, been practicing a lot." Serena meekly admitted.
"More like constantly." Miette smiled. "She'd keep practicing until the sun came up again in the morning if she could." She leant back in her seat and smiled more. "Of course, she dropped all of that when she heard you were showing up, Ash." She smirked.
Serena went a dark shade of red. She enjoyed Miettes company - she did - but she really wished that she would stay quiet sometimes. She was certain she was only here to embarrass her. That that was literally her only reason for sticking around.
"Oh?" Ash said with a smile. He could help smiling at hearing this. It wasn't a conscious choice.
Serena suddenly became incredibly embarrassed. She glanced down and looked at her recently emptied glass. She needed to just get away for just a few seconds. Collect herself again. "I- uh, I'm going to uh, get another drink." She tried to make herself sound irritated, and threw a glare at Miette, but it sounded sort of awkward for her. She quickly got up and made her way to the self service drink dispensers.
Ash raised a quizzical eyebrow. "Uh... Did she seem to be in a hurry to leave, or was that my imagination?"
Miette smiled. "A bit of both."
"How so?"
"Can't say."
"Can't or won't?"
"A bit of both."
Ash sighed. "Good to see you haven't changed much." Miette was more cryptic than any mystery novel detective story you could possibly care to name.
"I have." Miette smiled again. "I just act like this 'cause it's fun." Her face relaxed into a more neutral, serious look. "I wasn't kidding earlier though. She really did change a lot of her routine up once she got your messages that you were coming back." She then smiled lightly. "It was... Nice, to see her like that."
Ash glanced towards Serena, who was pressing several buttons on the self service dispenser. From what he could tell, it was refusing to co-operate with her. "What do you mean?"
Miette sighed lightly. "Since you left, she's really thrown herself into performances. Like she can't focus on much else. She focuses a bit too much. I have to remind her to break occasionally." Miette mused for a couple of seconds, glancing at the sky before refocusing on Ash. "Quite a bit like you were when I was around, actually."
Ash wasn't sure if he was supposed to either smile or sigh.
"She cares about you a lot, you know." Miette said, casually.
Ash looked at the blue haired performer who was smiling warmly at him. Miette spoke again. "Keep it a secret I told you?"
Ash nodded.
Miette sat upright and leaned closer to him and whispered. "Most days, you're all she talks about."
This did cause Ash to blush a bit. Faint enough that Miette couldn't call her out on it, thankfully, but still, it was there. Miette sounded so confident in what she was implying. Miette had a confident personality, it was easy for Ash to chock it under that, but still. It seemed more than that.
"I'm not saying that you owe her anything." Miette said, raising her hands defensively up to be level with her shoulders. "But... I don't know. It just seemed wrong to stay quiet about It." Ash noticed this. This was new for Miette. At least for him to see. He never took her as the kind to go out of their way to this degree for someone they didn't get along with at first, and for someone else they didn't really know all that well. "I know how we used to be, but Serena's my friend." Ash's eyes widened slightly. Of course they were. They had been traveling together, for gods sake. It was just weird to hear it from Miette. "I look out for my friends. It might be worth bringing up with her when you're alone?...I don't know. I don't know what I expect you to do with that info. It just..."
Ash smiled weakly. "I appreciate it. Thanks Miette." He had to admit, she'd changed. Dramatically, but she was still the same blue haired trouble maker as before. It was amusing to him. The more things changed, the more they stayed the same. Ash finally came to understand what that saying meant.
At that moment, Ash heard footsteps behind him, he glanced behind him, and sure enough, there was Serena, looking mildly frustrated. "Sorry about that. The self service thing was... Not serving me."
Ash glanced behind her. He could see smoke rising from where she had been. Either she had pounded it into oblivion, or, more likely, there had been an issue with the machine before she had used it. Either way, Ash couldn't help smiling.
Once Serena sat down, the group heard a loud beeping sound, going off in rapid succession three times, before subsiding. Miette reached into a pocket, and held up an electronic device. She glanced at it for a few seconds before taking a sharp inhale. "Yikes."
"What?"
"You know that place we went, Serena? That... What's the name... That store with the fondant. The cake topping place before?"
"Yeah?"
"I might have uh, ordered something from there and uh... Yeah, I need to head over there."
"Why?"
"They wouldn't say." Miette sighed, standing up.
"That seems like odd business practice." Ash muttered quietly.
Once Miette stood up, she locked eyes with Ash, before motioning her eyes towards Serena. Before Ash could register what she meant, she had turned around. "I'll be back in a little bit. Don't wait up."
Miette was suddenly gone. And it was just Serena and Ash alone. Like Ash thought they would have been from the start. Suddenly, words wouldn't come. He suddenly felt awkward, knowing what Miette told him. He wanted it to be true, and if it was, that was beyond magnificent, but even so, that wouldn't make asking any less weird. The jokey atmosphere was gone. It had been replaced with something more crushingSerena broke the silence. "I missed you, you know."
Ash went a bit red. "Huh?"
"You, Clemont, Bonnie... I miss the old days. When we went around Kalos together. But..." Serena smiled at him sadly. "I missed you most. I could visit Clemont and Bonnie anytime... But it would have been so much harder to come visit you. And.. "
Ash smiled at her warmly. Comfortingly. "I don't blame you, Serena. It's not easy to get trips to Kanto.. It's just easier for me because I'm from there."
"Besides, I don't know if you'd have wanted me at Kanto."
This surprised Ash. "Why wouldn't I want you there?"
Serena bit her lower lip and sighed. "I don't know. I feel like I'd be in your way. I know you were doing a lot of important work with Professor Oak. I didn't want to get in the way of that."
Ash smiled sadly once again. Serena had often out others ahead of herself. She wasn't selfish enough. That was likely one of the only complaints he could really say about her. "I... missed you as well, Serena."
Serena looked at him, blushing lightly, and smiled again. "Thank you..."
Ash decided to change the topic for her. "So, what have you been doing while I've been away. We spoke via mobile a lot, but we didn't discuss what we were doing at the time a great deal."
Serena took a sip of her drink. "Not a lot different. I've been traveling around Kalos still. I spent a few months in Hoenn studying contests."
Ash raised his eyebrows. He hadn't expected that. He nodded. "It's... A beautiful region, huh?"
"Gorgeous." Serena agreed. "Contests there seem like combinations of performance showcases, and gym battles."
"Did you take part in any?"
"One." Serena admitted. She reached into her bag, and held up a ribbon, a golden centre, and the red ribbon surrounding it. "I got this for it."
"You won?"
"Yeah. Sylveon impressed them. We didn't do so well in the battle segment in terms of, well, battling, so we focused on looking the best we could. I guess it worked. The few hits we got in, and making ourselves look better with the enemy attacks, I guess it was enough to win." She scratched her head lightly and laughed lightly. "It's an... Interesting cultural difference."
"I'm guessing it's not for you though."
"No." Serena confirmed, shaking her head. "It was fun, defiantly. I'm glad I did it... But... Not something I want to keep doing."
"Wish I could have seen it." Ash smiled. Serena would have had an advantage. Performances were showcases primary focus, and she was damn good at those. He could only imagine the appeal stage being an absolute joke for her. "I bet you were amazing."
Serena blushed. "You're making me blush."
Ash grinned.
Serena's face became solemn suddenly. "Um... I'm sorry for going back to this topic..." She apologised randomly. "But... What's your plan?"
Ash's smile disappeared. He knew what she was getting at. Such a conversation had been bound to remind her. It was unavoidable. When was he going to leave her again? "I'm not sure." He admitted. "The plan was to visit you here for a few days, and then I'd be getting a flight to the Igneous region. There's supposed to be a lot of strong trainers and Pokemon there. Harsh environments make strong natives, the brochure said."
Serena smiled weakly, sadly. Ash could have sworn she was fighting back tears. "Still aiming to be the best, huh?"
Ash nodded. "The very best." He sighed. "But... Me and Pikachu... We thought... Well... There's still gotta be stuff to do in Kalos, right? It's not like we did everything there is to do here, and we don't know when we'll get another chance to visit, so, we uh..." Ash swallowed. "We kinda wanted to know if you wanted to travel with us again. Like the old days."
Serena's face froze for just a few seconds. After those few seconds had passed, tears ran down her cheeks. Her face went red, and she covered it with her hands. Suddenly, Ash felt horrific. "Hey, Serena!" He said, quickly getting up and kneeling next to her. "Hey, I didn't - I didn't mean to -" he was cut off by the Kalosian girl throwing her arms around his neck and hugging him tightly, for the second time that day"
"Sorry." She sniffles, trying to dry her eyes with her hand. "I didn't... I shouldn't have just... I'm so..." She tried to express such unadulterated joy, but couldn't. "I... I can't think of anything else I'd rather do." She managed to say. "They're tears of joy, Ash."
Ash felt his heart beat. He returned the hug happily. "Good."
Well, I'm hoping this chapter will make up for a lack of actual Amourshipping in Loyalty. I do actually have a plan to take the characters to the Igneous region, but that's still in drafting. Not too sure what I'm gonna do with Miette if that happens. She might stick around. She's sort of become a sort of character I have in mind for independent projects.
Speaking of which, you guys were very supportive of my ideas, Cosmic Hand in particular. So, I've decided, I'm going to give it a shot. I'm going to find a site I can upload it to, and then I'll let all of you know, and leave a link to find it, FF. net willing. If not, I'll link it on my profile. So, thanks for the vote of confidence to give it a shot.
While I'm here, I have a question for y'all. Mass Effect Fanfic, Shepard X Tali. Any takers? I'm starting to swell with ideas for Cosmic Hand, and seeing as the romance part of it is quite similar to ShepTail, seems logical to try my hand at one. Plus, I've played so much ME the past month, and Talk is the best freaking character and love interest ,(Nothing you say can convince me otherwise. ) I feel like I kinda need to get it outta my system. If no takers, I'll upload them on an alternate account, so be honest. It'd mostly be something I wrote for my own sake, anyway, so let's hear it. I don't wanna upload anything you guys wouldn't like.
Be sure to leave a review to answer anything I said here, and to let me know what you guys want to see, think of the fic so far, and what you think the Igneous plot line could entail. I love hearing from you guys, it always makes me smile, and keeps me motivated. Half the fun I get from writing is waiting for all your awesome responses, so, let's have it.
Anyways, I do hope you enjoyed this chapter of Loyalty. I'll work to get the next one up for you as soon as I can. See ya!
