Hey Everybody! Boy, I am glad to have this chapter done! I mean, it's a very good chapter, but I'm excited because I'm getting closer to the fun part (at least in my opinion) of the story! As for this installment, I can't say much about it because I would end up giving everything away, but I will say that it should satisfy at least some of you (though probably not all). I also wanted to say that this week I travel to Mississippi for about five days to visit my family there. I have to say that while I love them and everything, they annoy me slightly; and one of the biggest things that annoys me about them is that they don't have wi-fi. Therefore, unfortunately I will be unable to update this story next Sunday. I hope y'all understand, and I want to say that I will have chapter nine out by July 19, if not earlier. Anyway, please enjoy the chapter. It wasn't nearly as hard to write as some of the others have been, but it was still difficult. If you like it, please tell me in a review, and if you don't, then still tell me. We blew past fifty reviews for the last chapter, and I am hoping we can get to seventy-five (if not higher) with this one.

Disclaimer: I do not own Pokemon, or any of its affiliated companies including, but not limited to, 4Kids, The Pokemon Company, Game Freaks, or Cartoon Network. The characters written within this fic are soley based upon the fictional characters created by these companies, and the story is not meant to, nor will it, receive any monetary funding.

Characters' Ages:

Ash: 16

Brock: 21

Misty: 17

Dawn: 13

Delia: 40

Oak: 55

Gary: 16

Ritchie: 18

'Pikachu, use Quick Attack!' ordered Ash as the referee lowered the flags, signaling the beginning of the final battle. Adhering to the command, Pikachu began sprinting towards Sparky, leaving behind a streak of light.

Realizing the need for a rapid response, Ritchie formulated a plan. 'Sparky, Discharge!'

Sparky instantly surrounded himself with an electrical charge, and as Pikachu drew near (he was going too fast to stop now), Sparky unleashed the voltage, sending Pikachu flying backwards. As Pikachu rolled across the battlefield, unable to get back on his feet, Ritchie began his assault.

'Great! Now use Double Team!' After the request was given, Sparky suddenly seemed to multiply on the field, running so fast that it appeared that there were twenty of him surrounding Ash's Pokémon. As Pikachu got back to his feet and saw the twenty or so look-alikes covering him, he awaited, with bated breath, his master's orders.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

"Um, Mrs. Ketchum?" asked a nurse as she entered the hospital room. Ash was now into day seven of his comatose state, but both Misty and Delia had yet to give up even the slightest amount of hope that their loved one would awaken soon.

"Yes," answered Mrs. Ketchum. She began to feel worried as she saw a look of confusion on the nurse's face. With growing concern in her voice, she asked, "What's the problem?"

Opening her eyes widely, the nurse put a hand to her mouth, apparently embarrassed. "Oh, I'm so sorry! I didn't mean to scare you like that. It's just that Officer Jenny is in the hallway and is requesting permission to see you."

Feeling anger beginning to swell inside her, Misty took over as Mrs. Ketchum donned a look of confusion not too different to the one the nurse had had only moments earlier. "What do you mean, she wants to see us?" inquired Misty, obviously terrifying the nurse by asking her in such a low, growling voice.

"Uh, I-I don't know exactly, but she says that it's urgent," said the nurse. "Apparently she sent you an e-mail a week ago that was never responded to." As she had said "you" she pointed at Delia.

"Well, you can just go tell Officer Jenny that if she takes one step in this room I'll personally rip out -"

"Bring her in," interrupted Delia in a quiet, whisper-like, voice.

"What?" asked Misty. Now it was her turn to feel confused. Why would Mrs. Ketchum want to see the woman who started this whole mess?

"Trust me Misty," said Delia, turning her gaze away from the nurse and looking at her son on the bed. "It's best she see what she did."

Understanding instantly what Mrs. Ketchum meant, Misty silently nodded in agreement, and leaned back into her seat after having almost jumped out of it when she had heard of their newest visitor.

Walking out of the room and into the hallway, Delia heard the nurse talk to the officer. "You can go in now, but I caution you to be careful. These women have been through a great ordeal over the past week because of you, and I've seen many relatives in almost this same situation go berserk at the slightest annoyance, let alone the person who caused their grief in the first place."

Frankly, Delia wasn't surprised by the nurse's knowledge of the case. Ever since that morning when Ash had arrived in the hospital, reporters had been swarming the outside of the hospital (they were never allowed to enter) and the Ketchum residence. Although neither of the women had spoken to the reporters for obvious reasons, Delia had been telling Brock every morning what he could say to the reporters when they came to the house. She allowed him to update them on Ash's status, and she told Brock to only give the basic outline of what had happened that night.

However, the media was pretty smart and they had been able to piece together a lot of what Brock had told them to figure out the whole story. Of course, they also got a lot of help from those who had been at the party at the time of the incident. Even though Delia had personally called the hundreds of guests and asked that they not discuss what had happened, she knew that the story was ultimately going to prove impossible to contain. Now, every night she would find on the news (both local and international) "The Ketchum Update" or "Champion Status". Her son had already been very well known by the masses because of his placing in the four regional leagues, but because he had not even two weeks earlier been crowned the Sinnoh Champion before the incident, he was gathering attention from around the world. While it was nice to know that her son was cared for by so many people, Delia secretly wished they would stop making such a big deal out of it. She really just wanted peace around her so she could focus on the most important thing; her son's well-being.

Despite all of this though, she had come to enjoy one aspect of the media attention. Ever since it was leaked that the Pallet Town Police was responsible for Ash's condition, every night on the news the small force received a thorough tongue-lashing for their rash behavior. Delia had seen Jenny on the air at least three dozen times now trying to explain why she ordered an attack on the latest Sinnoh regional champion when he was trying to retrieve his Pokémon from a bandit. Each time she was questioned, she always seemed flustered and upset, and every time said she "deeply regretted" what had happened in the air.

I bet you regret what happened, thought Delia bitterly. If you hadn't been caught being an idiot you wouldn't care, but now you have to.

The sound of someone clearing their throat behind the angered woman snapped her out of her thoughts. She turned around in her seat to find Officer Jenny standing there, staring at her shoes.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

'Pikachu!' cried Ash as he tried to navigate his loyal Pokémon away from the dozens of Ritchie's Sparkys surrounding him. 'Jump in the air and use Thunder on all the Pikachu!'

Pikachu quickly responded to the command by using his tail to jump high in the air. However, as he prepared to unleash one of his most lethal attacks from the electric pouches on his cheeks, he suddenly felt as if he couldn't move.

'Great job Sparky!' yelled Ritchie from his side of the field. 'Keep weakening 'im with Thunder Wave!' The several Sparkys that were circling Ash's buddy were unleashing a blue electric bolt from their bodies, completely paralyzing Pikachu.

'Pikachu!' Ash screamed as he realized that he was trapped.

How can I stop the attack? he pondered. Thinking about Pikachu's known moves, he suddenly thought of one that could get his pal out of this fix.

'Pikachu, use Light Screen!' ordered Ash. He knew that Thunder Wave was trapping his Pokémon for the moment, but he also knew that the amount of energy Sparky was using to do both Double Team and Thunder Wave was going to wear him out within a few seconds.

Sure enough, moments later Sparky could be heard panting hard. 'Pi-pi-pi,' it wheezed as it began to slow. Within a minute, the several Pikachu who were simultaneously attacking Ash's Pokémon had been reduced to one, and Pikachu found his opening.

Sparky's Thunder Wave no longer had the strength to contain Pikachu, so the small mouse Pokémon was able to unleash what appeared to be a shield of electricity in front of his body, completely blocking Sparky's attack from being effective.

'Alright Pikachu!' yelled Ash happily. 'Now, use Iron Tail!'

Running towards Sparky, Pikachu's tail began to glow a bright light. When he was less than three feet in front of his opponent, Pikachu suddenly pivoted on his right foot, swinging the large, metallic tail at Sparky, who the entire time had been catching his breath and was unable to move out of the way.

'CHUUUUU!' screeched Sparky as he was flown across the battlefield.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

Now we've got the upper-hand, thought Ash, smirking.

"Mrs. Ketchum," began Officer Jenny after a few awkward moments of silence. She had grabbed an extra chair, and was now sitting directly across from Delia. "I am sorry about your son."

For a second, Delia simply stared at the officer, seemingly unaware of what to say at a time like this. However, her apparent indifference to the statement suddenly vanished from her face as her eyes grew wide with anger, and she pointed an accusative finger at the policewoman.

"Sorry?" she asked, almost in disbelief. Raising her voice she continued, "Here my son is in the hospital, and you come here a week after you put him here to say sorry?"

Crap, thought the officer. She had never been good at apologies (she didn't usually have to give them), and although she was genuine in her regret, she realized the second her apology slipped from her lips that she had made the wrong choice of words.

"Listen," Jenny said, raising her hands up trying to calm down the now irate mother in front of her. "I-"

"No!" interrupted Delia. "You listen to me!" Her voice was suddenly quieter, but somehow it did not lack any of the menace it contained from when she was screaming.

"I listened to the entire ordeal from when you and your force were in the air with my son," she explained, "and you disgust me."

All Kanto police officers were required to wear a recording device while on duty in order to prove in court whether or not they had abused their power in any way. Using the tape recording from that night, Delia had learned exactly what had happened, as had the world. Someone had snuck a copy of the tape out of the police station (tapes were never meant to be heard in public unless they were needed in trial) and had given it to the Kanto News and Service Report, which was one of the largest news stations in the region. Now everyone in the world had heard at least part of Jenny's and Ash's conversation from a week earlier, and it had only worsened the case for the police station (which was fighting allegations that they were secretly working for the person who had stolen the Pokémon).

"I mean, I understand that you didn't know who the criminal was, although you should have been smart enough to recognize Ash from the thousands of pictures of him on all those magazines and television reports," continued Delia. "However, what bothers me is that you didn't even listen to him! He was telling you that he would comply with you, but that wasn't enough! You had to bully him, and harass him until he had no choice. He loves his Pokémon so much, and that night you made him choose between obeying the law and the well-being of his Pokémon."

After Delia finished her speech, she just leaned back into the hospital chair and folded her arms, staring angrily at the woman before her.

The room remained quiet for what seemed like hours, but was probably only a minute or two. Misty just sat in the corner (having moved the chair further away from the feuding women), and watched on as Delia showed more emotion than she had in days.

Breaking the silence, Jenny quietly responded. "I'm so sorry." As she said this, a tear could be seen rolling down her right cheek.

Although she was surprised to find Jenny (whom she did not really believe was repentant for her actions) crying, Delia did not really feel much sympathy. Why are you crying? she asked the officer in her head. I'm the one in pain here, not you.

"I just couldn't see who I was talking to," Jenny went on to explain, all the while letting her tears begin to flow freely. "It was dark, and I had never been put in that situation before. When I saw him there, riding that Charizard, I just assumed he was lying and was part of Team Magma."

"But he wasn't," reminded Delia. She was not about to forgive this woman for what had happened.

"No he wasn't. All this week I've taken a beating from everybody; the town, the news, and even my co-workers at the station. As we speak, the courts are looking at this case wondering if they should pull me off the force for reckless behavior, and you know what?" asked Jenny, looking up from her lap and directly into the eyes of Delia.

"What?"

"I hope they do. This was my first big test as the head of police, since I was just appointed Chief a few weeks ago, and I failed miserably. I let you down, I let Pallet down, and most importantly," she paused for a second to wipe away some of the tears and take a quick breath. "And most importantly I let Ash down. I've listened to that tape a hundred times now, and every time I ask myself 'why didn't I listen?', and I can never answer. I guess my ego was too big to heed your son's words, and now I hope I pay the ultimate price for my foolishness."

"You certainly deserve it," replied Delia coldly as she stared back at Jenny with cool, unwavering eyes. She did not feel remorse for having been hard on the policewoman. Until her son woke up, if he ever did, she could not imagine herself feeling even the slightest compassion for the young lady's problems. The only thing she regretted right now was that she was not the one to file for Jenny's dismissal from the force.

Understanding that the hurt mother was not going to forgive her, and knowing she could do or say nothing else, Jenny began to get up and walk towards the door. However, when she reached for the handle, she suddenly remembered one of the reasons she had come in the first place.

"Oh! I almost forgot!" As she said this, Delia and Misty quickly turned their heads toward the woman wondering what in the world she wanted to say so badly that it made her decide to remain in this awkward situation any longer.

Reaching into a purse she had brought with her, she scooped out four pokeballs. "I found these."

Her eyes widening in surprise, Delia quickly got up from her seat and went to collect the small red and white balls. "How did you get these?" she asked, temporarily replacing her rage at the officer with curiosity.

"Well, I've felt so terrible this past week that I've committed all the free time I've had to searching for the whereabouts of the Pokémon. I was just lucky. I knew that the thief had been riding a Fearow, which is commonly used by Team Rocket for any aerial missions they need done, so I used one of our undercover agents to find out if any of the local Rocket hideouts had received new Pokémon, and sure enough the one in South Pallet had received four the very night of the, er, incident." explained Officer Jenny, feeling slightly proud of herself. "The Pokémon in the balls are Ivysaur, Buizel, Glalie, and Heracross. Those are the ones that he was missing, correct?"

"Y-Yes," replied Delia. She did not feel sorry for what she had said earlier, but she self-admittedly felt a little better knowing that Jenny had dedicated so much time towards finding her son's Championship-winning Pokémon.

Remembering something important, Delia asked another question, hoping she would get a good answer. "Does this mean you found Mallory?"

"No," Jenny replied, bowing her head. "Our agent was able to find the Pokémon at the hideout, but she was nowhere to be seen in the surrounding area. We presume that with all the attention she had garnered that night, she probably just completed her mission and flew away as fast as she could before we realized that we had made a mistake."

Feeling her spirits drop again, Delia murmured a "thanks" and closed the door on the officer. She then carefully placed the pokeballs on the little nightstand next to Ash's bedside.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

As Sparky got back on his feet after receiving huge damage from Pikachu's Iron Tail, Ritchie formulated another strategy. 'Spark, use Dig!'

Dig again? thought Ash, as he remembered Ritchie's Charmeleon using the same move earlier. He must have taught them with a TM or something.

As Sparky went underground, Pikachu grew nervous on the field while waiting for his opponent to appear. Ash knew that if Sparky was able to get a good hit at Pikachu, then Dig would be very effective and his Pokémon might not have enough health to continue the battle.

Looking at Pikachu's feet, Ash noticed the ground beginning to tremble slightly. 'Pikachu, stand on your tail and use Iron Tail!' ordered Ash, knowing that Sparky would emerge soon.

Pikachu immediately obeyed, and a split-second later, Sparky broke through the ground. However, when he came up, he hit his head with a loud "THUD" against Pikachu's iron tail.

'CHAAAA!' it cried as it fell back into the hole it had dug.

Not wanting him to have time to recover, Ash quickly ordered Pikachu to follow Sparky into the hole.

Pikachu quickly dove into the dark opening, and for a few moments no sound could be heard at all. Then, electricity began raging out from under the ground, completely destroying the battlefield and causing Ash to be temporarily blinded by all the light.

A minute later all the noise from the intense blast ceased and Ash looked up to find a large, smoldering crater in the middle of the field.

'Pikachu!' he cried, as he neither saw nor heard anything from his old friend. However, his fears subsided as he saw the little yellow mouse poke its head out of the crater while struggling to get out.

'Sparky!' cried Ritchie, appearing more distressed after he saw that Ash's Pokémon was still conscious. However, like Pikachu, Sparky soon jumped out of the crater, though both were badly bruised and beaten.

'Pikachu, do you think you have one more attack in ya?' questioned Ash to his tired Pokémon. He could see that both of the electric Pokémon were hurt, but he believed that Pikachu had more energy left than Sparky

'Pi!' replied Pikachu, curling his small fists. He looked determined.

On the other side of the field, Ritchie had, unknowingly, planned the same strategy as Ash. 'You can do this, right Sparks?' he asked his panting Pikachu.

'Pi-pi!' replied the small Pokémon, mimicking his opponent's movements.

'Volt Tackle, now!' cried both trainers simultaneously.

As the attacks were given, both Pokémon began to run at each other in a head-on collision. Growing nearer to each other, their small bodies became engulfed in electrical barriers as they prepared for their final assault. Despite the crater in the middle of the battlefield, both of the electric-types simply continued running towards each other. When they reached the hole's edge, they jumped towards each other using the large amount of momentum they had gained while running.

As their two heads collided in mid-air, a loud "CRACK" could be heard throughout the stadium. The electricity that they had stored was released upon contact, and for the second time in that match, Ash had to look away because the resulting light emanating from the two was too bright to be looked at directly.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

Delia had gone to get a drink of water, leaving Misty alone in the room. The water trainer noticed the remote on the windowsill, so she grabbed it and turned on the television. As Misty flipped through the channels on the small television screen that evening, she wondered what Ash was going to do if he woke up.

Is he gonna still want to go on his journey with me? she worriedly asked herself. What if he doesn't feel up to that challenge, or if he doesn't want me to come with him after all this?

She didn't really know why she was worrying about that. Ash had always seemed to like Misty's company a lot, and he had never denied her permission to go with him on an adventure before, but with him on that bed all week she had begun to grow pessimistic.

If we do go, I wonder if he'll still want Brock to go with us. She remembered the previous night when he had mentioned that the trio should reunite to go on their final journey together. She had intended to tell him immediately that she really wanted their last journey to just be him and her, although she couldn't explain why. However, she was cut off mid-sentence as Mallory and her Fearow broke through Ash's window and flew away, causing her and Ash to completely forget their conversation. Ever since then though, that conversation was all she could think about.

I guess I just want it to be us because it's been such a long time since I travelled with him that I want some time for just us to hang out together, she rationalized in her mind. That's what I'll tell him when he wakes up. That is, if he wakes up and if he still wants to go with me.

As she turned off the television (almost every channel was talking about Ash), she looked at her friend and wondered if that really was the reason she wanted them to go alone.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

As Ash looked up at the battlefield, all he could see was smoke. Coughing, he wondered who had won the battle.

As he continued to look in the hazy distance for Pikachu he thought something seemed strange. He noticed that he no longer heard the audience cheering in the background, nor did he hear the commentator speculating about the victor.

As a matter of fact, he thought, I don't hear anything at all.

As the smoke began to thin he looked around, and to his amazement found that the stadium no longer existed. Beyond the battlefield, everything was pitch-black. Looking across the field, he also noticed that Ritchie was no longer there.

What happened to everybody? he silently asked. Did I win?

'Pika-pi,' cried Pikachu from within the crater, which he must have fallen into after attacking Sparky.

'Pikachu? Are you okay?' Ash inquired. He wanted to go see his buddy, but was afraid of being disqualified for stepping onto the battlefield. He thought it seemed ridiculous to care about the battle at this point, with both the referee and the opponent gone, but he couldn't shake the feeling growing inside him by the second that he absolutely had to win this battle.

'Pi-pi!' yelled the little electric mouse, as he sprang out of the crater. He ran into Ash's opening arms and nestled his head into his trainer's chest.

'Pikachu, what's goin' on?' Ash asked as he held his Pokémon and watched the battlefield fade from his sight. Now only he and Pikachu remained, and as he stood there, he mused that perhaps the light from the explosion had hurt his eyes. He was shaken from his train of thought however, as he suddenly saw the referee emerge from the darkness with a single sheet of paper in his hand.

The referee walked slowly towards the presumed winner and his Pokémon, and when he stood less than six inches in front of Ash, he handed him the paper. He then, without saying a word, turned around and walked back into the darkness.

'Hey!' yelled Ash at the retreating figure. 'What's goin' on? Where is everybody?'

However, the referee simply continued walking until he was out of sight. Not understanding what was going on, Ash remembered the paper in his hand.

He turned it over to read what it said, and was confused as he read the short six word message. It stated:

Congratulations! Good luck on your journey.

'What?' asked Ash aloud as lifted his head from the letter. Thinking he must have missed something he reread the paper, but realized there was nothing else written on it.

'What do you think that meant Pikachu?' Ash asked his friend. However as he asked the question, he noticed that he could no longer hear himself. He looked down at the yellow Pokémon in his arms, and saw that both of them were beginning to fade. As he screamed for help, he once again heard no sound emit from his mouth.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

"Ungh," groaned Ash, as his body suddenly came back to life on the hospital bed.

"Huh?" said Misty as she and Delia snapped their attention away from the comedy show they had been watching. They both distinctly heard Ash make a moaning sound.

"Is he waking up???!!!" asked Delia. She was already sitting next to her son, but when he made the noise, she immediately stood up and examined him closer.

"I don't know, but I swear I heard something!" replied Misty excitedly as she watched Ash.

"I'm gonna get the nurse!" shouted Delia as she ran out of the room. She needed to know if there was something they could do to help Ash wake up.

As she left, Misty took a closer look at Ash. "C'mon Ash, wake up!" she yelled. A minute passed and she didn't hear him say anything else. Afraid that maybe what had just happened was a fluke or her imagination, she began to grow nervous.

"Please Ash!" she pleaded. "Wake up!"

Unfortunately, Ash continued to just lie there, and Misty felt her eyes beginning to water at the realization that he wasn't going to move. Leaning closer to Ash, their faces just inches apart, Misty begged her friend one last time, already knowing it wouldn't work.

"Please wake up," she whispered as tears began to cascade down from her cheeks onto Ash's.

At that moment, Ash opened his eyes, and a small smile crept upon his face as he saw Misty staring back at him; a completely shocked expression plastered on her face.

Author's Notes: Well, there you have it! Ash is finally with Misty again and out of the coma. I personally am vey happy about this because writing dual scenes for a story is a lot harder than I first assumed it would be. However, I think I pulled it off rather nicely. If you agree with me then, REVIEW PLEASE, and if not, then still REVIEW PLEASE.

Unfortunately, I am being pressed for time so I cannot give any new recommendations for this week, but I will continue to say that anyone who has time needs to read "The Refuge" by SecretAgent99, "Reunited, Happily and Painfully" by MoltresFeather, and all of Pokeshipper101's fics (they're all one-shots, even though I think PS101 would make a great chapter author if they wanted to be one).

I also wanted to say quickly that I apologize to anyone who has reviewed my story and has not received a "thank you" message from me in return. I like to keep up with everyone who takes the time to review my story, but I was lazy this week (my first real week of vacation) and only wrote a few people. I promise to keep up with those who critique my fic better in the future than I have this past week. Please continue to review my story, and do not think that I don't appreciate it (I really, really do).