Spring Regionals, The 13th. [Present Year]

Ash stared at the two names highlighted on the computer screen. Clicking on the links saved on the side of his typed notes, he opened four streamed videos into separating windows. He dragged and placed them side by side for comparison. They were the only videos found in the BattleNet's website for the two highlighted names. The twelve other battles the two were involved in weren't officially recorded into official videos, which left a large sum of details about them unknown.

Of these two names, one would belong to the finalist that Ash would eventually face. From their records and videos alone, it was obvious that he was outclassed. Either of them being claimed as the Champion of the Johto region would not have surprised him. What was surprising was that the both of them were only runner-ups in previous deciding tournaments. Being a Champion must be a class of its own, he feared.

In direct comparison, he was an absolute underdog. An underdog who wasn't even sure if he could win tomorrow's match - the match that would decide whether or not he could face one of the two names highlighted. He was an underdog who wasn't even sure who he was battling tomorrow.

The match that continued late into this hour of the night, belonged to Dawn and Kenny - Dawn's childhood friend. Such a coincidental battle would have been considered 'favored by Fate'. Two Coordinators from the same foreign region, sharing the same intimate history, mysteriously running into one another in the same tournament without knowing each other's personal decision of entering... In many people's eyes, the battle wasn't just 'favored by Fate', it was made by Fate. And its prolonged length, having lasted for at least two hours since its beginning, only solidified that humored consideration into a hopeful fact.

The very idea of it, however, sickened Ash.

He moved the video's clips around, trying to sync portions of the battles together for better comparisons. He did this to ignore the thought of those two battling. To ignore the churning feelings in his stomach and inside his chest. He studied his possible final opponents, ignoring the actual possible opponents he was supposed to face next, so he could ignore their existence for just a little longer.

Pikachu tiredly crawled onto his back and watched the videos alongside him. His company made Ash feel more at ease, and made him sourly realize how immature he was for watching the videos, and for studying his opponents so diligently. Ash was never the type to place all his worries on a studied strategy. Nor the type to watch videos of other battlers outside of casual enjoyment. He followed the instincts of battle more than anything else, and cared little to spend time figuring out what he couldn't understand. That was what kept him an underdog in people's eyes, what kept any real sense of victory just out of his reach, and what made him outclassed to everyone else in the tournament. But if he didn't battle in the way he did, caring as much and as little as he always had, then the answer found at the end of all his struggles would not be of any worth, nor would any of its meanings be clear.

With a silent nod to himself, he closed the hotel room's computer and jumped back onto the bed. Pikachu hopped onto his stomach in reply, staring into his eyes in interest.

Ash reached out and petted the Mouse Pokémon.

"I may not battle entirely with strategy, but I learn from my losses. And I'm not stubborn without a good reason. Right?" he quietly asked Pikachu.

Pikachu nodded in affirmation.

"Then what makes her and I so different, I wonder..."

A loud ring burst within the room. Panicked and surprised, Ash sat up with a jump and ran towards the phone. Picking up the voice receiver didn't stop the ringing. In its direct proximity, the volume of the ringing was intolerable. He worried if the neighbors could hear its aggravating trill.

'Incoming Video Call. Would you like VidCam [ON]?' blinked repeatedly on the small monitor, the cause of the endless ringing.

He attempted to press 'Yes' on the touch screen, then 'Yes' on the arrow pointing to a button. In self-annoyance he realized that the button was the 'Yes'. He pressed it immediately, repeatedly.

The monitor flashed and the face of a gorgeous young woman flared into view.

"Did you see the battle?!" May squealed in excitement through the vidphone, "That finishing move Dawn did was incredible! And, oh gosh, you two are going to be going at it at tomorrow's match! I'm so excited!"

Ash pressed the 'Volume Down' button several times before he could tolerate May's shouting. He laughed as he rubbed his ears. "So you call me after her battle but you don't call after mine?"

May's beautifully expressive face pouted at the camera. She had aged well through the years, maturing in features faster than most, earning quiet jealousies amongst her and his peers. As a Coordinator, her looks earned her as much points and popularity as her pokémon's techniques. And it was her well-polished and well-bred looks that had made her the superstar she was today. No Contest Ring was left unaware of the stunning 'Queen of Hoenn'. No region's magazine stands had been spared from her face on a front cover or a headline over her fashion tips. And no gossip show cared to keep quiet about her assumed naughty lifestyles.

Despite the sunburn of spotlights threatening to burn her skin off, May had never let her popularity get to her head. Deep down, her behavior remained that of a child's. And outwardly, her mindset never progressed past the teen years she spent with Ash.

This unchanged honesty is what kept her as Ash's best human friend. The two were in no hurry to mature in their outlooks on life, and found each other as their best companions in growing 'kind of old together'. Their divergent goals, however, prevented them from travelling side by side like they used to. A weekly vidcall wasn't out of the question, though.

"That's not fair. You know that your time slot was right before my work ended, right?" May whined in apology, "I'll go watch it later, okay? I had a friend record it for me. From what she said though, you did pretty amazing too. So I can't wait to see it. Really."

"You still sound more excited about her battle than mine." Ash teased.

"Oh come on. Seeing it is totally different from hearing about it. I'm sure if I saw yours I'd be - Wait a minute... Hold up." The brown-haired Coordinator moved away from the vidphone screen, lowering the volume of her laptop before re-appearing. "Mm-hm. That's what I thought! I can't hear the TV on your end! You weren't even watching her battle!"

"Well..."

"Ash, really?"

"I was studying my next opponents."

"She is your next opponent, Ash. So don't give me that. And don't give me that excuse either. I know you don't study your opponents. Especially in tournaments like these."

"I really was studying my next opponents, though. I already know how Dawn battles, so -"

"Quit it already." May sighed and pounded her palm against the camera. "I can't believe you're still doing this. That happened years ago, Ash. You can't keep holding it in like this forever. If you're never going to tell her, then just drop it. Forget about it completely. It's better off that way."

"It's not that I never told her. I kind of already told her. I told you that I told her."

"Yeah, years ago. And 'kind of' being underlined and highlighted! Look at it now. Things have changed since then. You don't think she's changed enough to listen to you now? Have you even seen her lately? She's a completely different person!"

"I saw her..."

"And?"

"And nothing. I just saw her. Twice."

"And you didn't even say 'hello'?"

"You think I would?"

May leaned forward, allowing the camera to only view her stern blue eyes. "Ash. Talk to her. I mean it. I know I said I was fine with you not ever talking to her again. But that was before I found out that you really can't get away from her. If you don't talk to her now, you'll just run into her again. Maybe in a week, maybe in a year, but it'll be just as hard to look at her then. And no matter what, I figure that you'll never get over her. So please, for your sake, for my sake, for everyone's sake, talk to her. Please. Don't make me beg."

Ash stared at the monitor's glaring eyes in aggravated quiet. With a loud sigh, he looked towards the camera and shook his head. "I'll talk to her. But not in the way you want me to. Tomorrow."

"If you're planning to talk to her through a Pokémon Battle, forget it, Ashley. Dawn's a Coordinator, like me. We don't talk with battles. We talk with outfits, stances, and moves. Not blows to the head."

"It's the only way I can really tell her what I want to say. You know that I don't talk about these kind of things. I'm not even used to feeling it. I can't express it with words or outfits, or stances, or whatever. Even if I said it with a battle, I wouldn't be entirely comfortable with it, you know. I'm not that type of person. But it's the only way I can do it..."

Seconds passed in silence. Before a minute could be reached, May's eyes disappeared from the monitor - the screen having turned pitch black. The text 'VidCam [OFF]' hovered at the corner of the blackness. Without picture, May finally spoke, with an unusually serious voice, "Tomorrow, I'm watching the battle. I'll make time for it. And after the battle, I'm going to call Dawn. I'll ask her if she understood what you tried to tell her in the battle. If she didn't, then I'll go ahead and tell her myself. And I won't put it nicely."

"May, if you do that..."

"Yeah, I know. I'm going to upset her. Terribly. I plan to. She's my friend, but you're my best. I'm willing to lose her if it means I can get that stupid burden off your heart."

"May..."

"Ashy. Tell her everything. Don't you dare hold back."

'VidCall [END]'

Winter Regionals, The 14th. [5 Years Pre-Present]

A snowball flew by and shattered against a nearby post. Another was thrown, chipping itself against the rim of his baseball cap. The third smacked the side of his head hard. With only a tilt and a light stumble, the target slid lazily across the handrail - barely noticing that something had pushed him. He managed to find a new position to stand and relax in, sinking himself back into deep thought.

One more snowball rocketed through the sky. It was blocked expertly by a swung purse. "You kids leave him alone! Otherwise I'll tell your parents!" Serena stormed across the small bridge, chasing away the children who were responsible for the cold projectiles. Seeing them run off in the distance, she returned her attention on the victim of the childish attacks. "Ash! Are you okay?"

Ash only continued staring off into the distance.

"Ash?"

He flinched. "H-Huh? Oh... It's you, Serena."

"Are you okay, Ash? What were you doing just letting those kids -" Serena's words drifted as she looked over the bridge's handrail. Below, a body of frozen water curved a sparkling path of pristine blue, sprinkled with pure white snow and dirtier black and brown slosh. The sky above and the trees surrounding it reflected against its surface in a dream-like quality.

'Sky Rink' was what the locals of Snowbelle City had unofficially named it. An ever-frozen river popular with families and young couples in its use as an ice skating rink. One such couple skated at its center now. A man of medium length black hair, and a woman of long blue. They were Ash's friends, Serena recognized. On the day of the Reunion, the blue-haired woman had spent all her time following Ash around - which had annoyed her greatly. And on the day after the Reunion, the black-haired man had spent all his time crying around Ash - which she felt sorry for. Ever since the day after, the woman would concern herself over the man, speaking, comforting, consoling, and tending to him. In return, the man would open up more to her, and spend more time with her. Now the two were practically inseparable. Which she was completely fine with. "Ah, it's those two."

"Dawn and Tracey." Ash named them for her. His stares returned to them, distancing itself in thoughts once again. "Both of them used to travel with me, but not at the same time. The day Tracey came into our room was the day they first met face-to-face. Before that, they only knew each other by picture, or by short glances during my vidcalls to the Professor. Professor Oak, that is. The old Professor I introduced to you at the Reunion."

Serena nodded and smiled. "For a while I thought he was your grandpa."

"He sort of is to me."

"That's sweet. Oh, and speaking of the Reunion. Is it over yet?"

"It ended six days ago. Well, five days, I guess."

"Then..." Serena turned towards Ash. "Why haven't they left yet? For that matter, why haven't we?"

"People usually stick around for a week after the Reunion. If they didn't get the time to talk to each other during it, they spend it in hanging out after it, before heading back home."

She looked back over the frozen water, staring at the lines the skaters traced in the ice. "I can't imagine those two heading back home without each other. They're like lovebirds now."

"It happens a lot during the Reunions. Lots of people start their relationship there."

Serena's face lit a familiar pink. The memory of her boldly holding onto Ash at the party swirled inside her embarrassed, yet cheerful thoughts. The memory, however, soon disappeared when she remembered why she came out here. "You... like her, don't you?"

"Hm?"

"That Dawn girl down there. The kids were pegging you pretty badly with snowballs and you didn't even glare at them. You were so deep in thought, I thought you were asleep. She was the one you were thinking about, right?"

Ash shrugged, unsure whether to nod or shake his head. "She's definitely the one on my mind, but it's not that I like her in that way."

"Really?"

"Well... She's special to me, I guess. But that's not why I got my head stuck in the clouds."

"Then what's wrong?"

His chin pointed back at the skating couple. "Tracey, I guess."

"You don't like him being with her?"

"Yes? No? It's hard to explain..."

Serena forced a smile, though it hurt in her heart. "You can tell me. Even if you can't say it right, I can still hear you out."

Ash scratched his hair in nervousness. "It's just... You could say that Tracey and I have a long history together. Not just in our travels, but after that too. We'd call each other a lot. And every year he'd come to the Reunion. I wouldn't call him my best friend, but I know him well enough. I know he's a good guy at heart, and at one point, he was a good guy in everything else too..."

He turned away from the skating rink and stared into the sky above it. Visions of the past slowly rolled into his imagined view. Some made him smile. Though the ones he thought of now could only make him frown. "He's older than me. And when we travelled together, he was kind of the 'older guy' of the group, the kind a kid looks up to or expects to do the mature stuff. And he did. He was a lot more mature than us. That Professor I introduced you to? Tracey worked under him for years. And for years, he was more than happy to continue his life as his assistant. I wouldn't be able to stay cooped up in a lab all day, but for mature, older Tracey - he could stand it as long as he could do his work."

Ash reached down, opening his backpack and searching through its contents. A folder was pulled out from its hold, and a single sheet of paper was pulled out from inside it. It was a wonderfully-made sketch of Pikachu. One that he received as a gift. He showed it to Serena, who seemed impressed by it. "Tracey's a Sketch Artist. And he worked under Professor Oak as a Pokémon Illustrator, making detailed observations, with pictures rather than words. That job was his dream job. And he loved spending every day working in it."

"Sounds like he had it pretty good." Serena said, handing him back the paper.

"He did... Then one year, during a Reunion, he got introduced to another artist. Bianca. Not that blond one you met at the party. There was another one with the same name. She was a Sketch Artist just like Tracey. That was why they were introduced to each other in the first place. And they got along together really well because of it. A simple, perfect match. Unlike anyone else Tracey had met in the years of his work and travels, Bianca understood him and his passions almost entirely."

"Where is she now?"

"Married. And her husband doesn't like her spending time around me, so she's not allowed to visit the Reunions anymore."

"He sounds insecure."

Ash shrugged. "I wouldn't know. All I know is that after she got married, Tracey broke down completely. Every vidcall and talk we had after that, he'd end up breaking down again and crying. He couldn't get over her. And what made it worse was the fact that Bianca had rejected him just before the ceremony began. He was trying to stop her, and that's just how it ended up."

"Goodness... that's terrible. No wonder he's so broken up about it."

"That's not what he was crying over when he got in the room."

"Huh?"

"He was crying over his parents that time. And last year, he was crying about his ex-girlfriend. Before that, a vidcall, about how the Professor had fired him. And before that, another girl rejected him. His car being stolen, with all his valuables in it. His house being burned to the ground. His copyrights underhandedly taken from him. His cousin using him in a scheme. Someone suing him for an unstoppable accident. And the list goes on and on."

"... I don't know what to say. That all sounds awful." Serena's gaze moved towards the man below. His gleeful laughs and smiles made her heart glad, relieved. "He's been through a lot. Hasn't he? He looks so sensitive. For all those terrible things to fall on him. It just isn't fair. But... he's better now, at least."

"At least." Ash repeated her last words, though with a tone of discontent.

"Is that bad?" Serena asked, unsure if Ash's current jealousies held any worth now.

"The things Tracey's gone through are terrible. But they didn't fall on him. He's just as much the cause of them existing, but he doesn't want to face that fact." Ash sighed. "I'm not the only friend he would cry to. He had others. And they abandoned him. Which gave him more reasons to be upset. But they didn't do it for selfish reasons. They left him because they grew tired of never being able to help him. Tracey would go from one problem to the next, not learning from his last mistake, not owning up to his last promises, not willing to hold himself back. And he pays for it every time. But he doesn't learn from it either."

Pointing out each finger by count, he solemnly explained, "His house caught fire because he invited some strangers to live with him. The strangers were shady and unnerving, but he let them into his house all the same, just because they pretended to empathize with him. His car was stolen because he left his keys with a 'nice girl' he had met that day, trusting her for no reason beyond the desperation to make a friend. His parents kicked him out of their house because he would keep trying to bring strangers home. The Professor fired him for that same reason - after one of the 'guests' stole a prototype the Professor was working on. He's rejected over and over again because he won't take a hint from the women he thinks he's formed a relationship with. His trusting and naïve nature gets him used by his cousin, gets his copyrights stolen, gets him sued for an obviously rigged accident, and gets him in jail for something he indirectly caused.

"The guy's bad luck is beyond terrible. But it's not as if he can't avoid it. He can avoid it very easily. Ever since that day he met Bianca, however, he's become completely irrational. You might think that his innocent naïvety is blameless and might wish it wasn't burned out by 'the cold world out there'... But there's a reason why it is rejected, why he's rejected over and over again."

Ash stood in silence, watching the clouds hover quietly over him. The look on his face swirled between upset and annoyed. He let neither take over completely. "I've tried telling him to just stick with his job, to repair and improve himself first before rushing to find another relationship, to doubt people just a little - not to reject them, but to scold them for doing something inherently bad. I've been telling him as nicely as I could to stop making himself the victim, so he could stop running into these problems. But he doesn't do it. He doesn't want to stand back and just see for once that it's his honest fault. Not without getting overdramatic and threatening suicide, that is."

He shook his head in slight disgust. "He's trapped in his own world now. Seeing illusions of people and events, rather than experiencing them first-hand. That world he made with Bianca was the only thing to make him so undeniably happy in his life, that he couldn't make himself give it up. Any feelings I have in sadness over it, though, are gone. He's hurting others because of that fantasy. Assuming and pushing himself onto others, just to keep that fantasy alive, rather than face the workable reality in front of him. If he just let it go... he would see that there are other things out there that can make him just as happy, if not happier. But he's clinging onto it like a desperate child. And like a child, he won't listen. And because he won't listen, he doesn't learn. I like Tracey. He's a good friend. And a good guy, really. But I can't condone what he's doing now."

Ash shook his head again, this time at himself. He gave the girl beside him an apologetic smile. "Sorry, I went off into a little personal rant there. I must've soured your mood for this morning."

Serena responded with a troubled frown. "N-No. No need to apologize, Ash... I just... I didn't know any of this. It makes the scene down there very different."

Ash nodded. "Right now, Dawn's comforting Tracey. In the same way we all wished we could comfort him. But she's not really doing anything for him. It's his fantasy that makes him happy right now. Dawn's just his replacement for the Bianca in that world."

"That's awful... Shouldn't you tell her that?"

"I will. But I can't right now. If I did and she listened, she would just abandon him immediately. And then what? Tracey would just break down again, and cling onto someone else. For now, I can only leave them alone until the right opportunity comes up."

"When do you think that will come up?"

He shrugged his shoulders. "If it doesn't come up anytime soon... I'll tell her tomorrow."