Within a few moments, Gary returned to the tent. "We found Ho-oh. It's settled on a roof of a hotel halfway across the city. Are you sure you're alright Ash?" Gary reported, concerned for his friend. Ash nodded slowly and putting Pikachu on the chair next to him, stood up in one fluid movement. Ash didn't want to risk hurting Pikachu if he fell over after standing up and struggled not to show any of his nausea to anyone watching him. He wasn't alright. He still felt very dizzy and nauseous especially when he moved his head quickly. His legs felt like jelly but he knew that he had to get to Ho-oh and he knew that if Brock saw all these things that he would stop Ash leaving the tent. Ash carefully walked out of the tent, staying close to the chairs in case he felt his legs go from under him. He managed to make it out of the tent without collapsing or throwing up and felt that after achieving that he must be feeling better.
He called out Charizard and called Pikachu over. Charizard gave a mighty roar and a flamethrower in greeting and then Ash and Pikachu climbed on to Charizard's back. Gary told Ash the name of the hotel and trainer and Pokémon rushed over to the hotel. It didn't take long to arrive there. Charizard landed on the roof as far away from Ho-oh as possible and Ash got off. He left Charizard out but ordered Charizard to do nothing. Pikachu stayed with Charizard both to keep Charizard under control but also so that they were far enough away to be no threat but close enough that Ash could get to them quickly, just in case. He knew that Ho-oh trusted him but he was also aware that Ho-oh could be so angry that it mightn't recognise Ash right away. In a way, Ho-oh was more dangerous now than when Ash first approached it.
Ash carefully walked a little away from his Pokémon, returning to his previous posture with his hands up in apparent surrender. "Ho-oh… can you hear me Ho-oh?" Ash called gently but loudly. Ho-oh wasn't sitting calmly like before. It was glaring at anything that came close and firing attacks at random towards news helicopters or a stray Pidgey. The size of the target didn't matter. The only reason Charizard had been able to land was because Ho-oh had been distracted but a news helicopter on the other side of the building. Ho-oh showed no evidence of hearing Ash. So he took a steadying breath and called a little more forcefully. He had to make sure Ho-oh was unable to be reasoned with before he attacked if he was to attack. Ho-oh turned to Ash and he immediately knew that Ho-oh was so angry that it couldn't recognise him. Ash managed to dive out of the way of the attack. Ash took a deep breath and knew he had to play the old "hope being reckless was enough" card and ran towards Ho-oh. Pikachu and Charizard thought Ash had gone mad but followed his orders to stay back.
Ash ran toward Ho-oh with no regard for his safety apart from dodging any attacks sent his way. He leapt on to Ho-oh's back and held on for dear life as the Pokémon bucked and reared wildly before finally taking to the sky to escape Ash's grip. Charizard slightly disobeyed Ash's orders and took off to follow Ho-oh in case the legendary Pokémon managed to toss Ash off and Charizard was needed to catch Ash before he hit the ground far below.
Ash clung onto the Pokémon like his life depended on it, because well it did. Ash shouted words to Ho-oh such as "it's Ash" or "calm down, it's alright" but nothing seemed to work. Ash didn't want to battle Ho-oh for two reasons. The first being that this wasn't Ho-oh's fault, it had seemingly been brought to Viridian City by humans that experimented on it. The second being that if Team Rocket hadn't stuck their noses in, then Ash would have already calmed Ho-oh down and they wouldn't have this problem. A third reason whispered in the back of head that he wasn't sure if he could take Ho-oh in a fair fight either, not that he would admit it to himself. Ash finally thought he had to try something else and just hoped that he could even pull off what he had to do in the situation he was in.
Ash squeezed his eyes shut and tried to block out everything around him and focus on exactly what he wanted to happen. He had only properly attempted to use his aura once before in the tree of beginning. However that time he had the security blanket of having Sir Aaron's gloves to help him. Ash focused with all his being to pull his own power to the surface. He wanted to create the same aura sphere he had made with Ho-oh's help on the roof earlier but this time he wanted the images to have sound. He wanted to reach past Ho-oh's anger and soothe it in the only way he knew he could.
So, can't think of anything I need to say…
Until the next chapter.