A/N: Thank you, everyone, for your continuing support! Once again, apologies if I haven't responded to your review or message yet, I'm terribly behind with that. But I hope that this fast update makes up for that haha.

Disclaimer: I don't own Pokémon or the picture used as cover (though I did edit it).

Days

The day Misty finishes her work on time

Misty

Sunday, February 2nd

People's opinion on Ghost type Pokémon.

Misty stared at the title of her report, her cursor moving over it. She changed the font, made the letters bigger and then smaller again, and settled on a bit larger size than the rest of her text, bolded and underlined.

Done.

She sighed and stretched herself out in the office chair, her shoulders popping when she raised her arms above her head. She had been sitting here for too many hours already. Her eyes felt dry from staring at the screen for so long.

But at least the report was finished now. Another thing she could cross off her list.

Misty smiled in satisfaction and got up from the chair, walking around in Violet's old bedroom, now turned office.

Now to just send this thing to Leaf and she was done working for today. Just past five, a glance at the clock told her. Her smile widened; she actually had an evening left!

Misty seated herself back in the chair, lounging back. Despite everything else happening in the world, life had actually gotten better than before. She had the stupid nausea to thank for that; due to her pregnancy and her physical complaints Leaf had decided that she no longer had to do the watch-Morty-shifts. Of course, it was expected that she kept up with her Gym and paperwork, but that was a sacrifice she gladly made.

All in all, that meant she was spending a more time at home and at the Gym, which in turn had a positive effect on her relationship with Ash and with her Pokémon.

If only the nausea would go away… Well, you couldn't have everything, she supposed. At least it was only the mornings.

Misty focused her attention back on her report. She had spent the afternoon typing out the notes she had been taking the past week into a comprehensible report about the opinions of her Gym challengers on Ghost type Pokémon.

Negative opinion about Ghost type Pokémon: 25/33.

Neutral: 6/33.

Positive opinion about Ghost type Pokémon: 2/33.

That was the short summary. Misty stared at the cold hard numbers and once again felt something in her gut sink. She had been working with these numbers all afternoon, but it was still painful to see.

She continued reading through her text, where the numbers became somewhat more nuanced. Ghost type Pokémon had always been one of the less popular types: about half of the people with a negative opinion had already disliked them before recent events. But that meant that half of that group had started to see Ghost types in a bad light because of the murders. Her talks with those Trainers confirmed that: some people had thought them creepy before, and these incidents had strengthened their views.

In a strange way, Misty could relate. She didn't like Bug types, and if she had heard that Bug types might be murdering people, she knew she would distrust them even more.

She frowned. They might have a serious problem on their hands with this, but no obvious solution appeared to her.

The neutral group generally held the same opinion about the situation: Pokémon weren't evil, but the humans who used them like that were. A sensible opinion.

And the two persons who had claimed they loved Ghost Pokémon had both owned at least one. The young man had told her that he could imagine that Ghost Pokémon played a role in these incidents, but that he couldn't believe that they would do these kinds of things willingly.

Misty paused in reading. She knew what she had written next.

The second Ghost lover had been a woman, some ten years older than Misty.

Misty shivered involuntarily.

The woman had appeared in a black, billowing cape, hood up, and had arrogantly insisted on challenging her. Now, that hadn't shocked Misty – she got enough weirdos finding themselves important and wanting to battle her. The battle had been exciting enough, but what had caught her attention was the woman's use of a Ghost type Pokémon: a Misdreavus.

It had been a perfect opening to ask her about her opinion on Ghost types.

The woman – Sayuri Asai, as she had introduced herself – had been mostly silent up until then, but at that she had burst out, "Ghost Pokémon are the future! The end of all we know is coming, and all that will be left are Ghosts, roaming the forgotten Earth! The world will drown and it will freeze and it will burn – it's already starting! And only those who recognize Ghosts as their saviors will be allowed to join them in this world! Only then your soul will be truly free! Join the Ghosts, girl, or fear the end! Only they can set you free!"

Back then, Misty had inwardly scoffed and outwardly just laughed awkwardly. She had quickly handed Sayuri her Badge with a standard congratulations speech and had been relieved when the strange persona had left her Gym.

Only later the creepy words started to take more meaning in her head.

The storm in Sinnoh that had hit the Tournament. The extreme cold that had reigned here in Kanto, now suddenly turned to a very early spring… Really, it could all be called a coincidence, as Misty tried to rationalize her fear away, but an itchy feeling remained.

Misty had not put her own thoughts in the report, just the literal words the woman had said to her, as much as she could remember anyway. Leaf and the others could make of that what they wanted.

A knock at the door startled her out of her thoughts, and a moment later Ash poked his head in. "How it's going? Dinner is ready if you want to eat." From the look on his face, he definitely wanted to eat.

Misty grinned and she felt her stomach rumble. Fortunately, the nausea was only in the mornings. "I'm almost done, just give me a few more minutes, I just need to email this report and then I'm done."

Ash's smile was a bit doubtful, and Misty frowned playfully at him. "Really, just a few more minutes, I swear."

Ash held up his hands in innocence but his smile had brightened. "Already, a few more minutes, then."

He closed the door behind him and Misty turned her attention back to the report. She scanned it for any glaring spelling mistakes and then sent it away to Leaf.

When she got downstairs Ash was sitting at the kitchen table, playing with Pikachu. She patted Pikachu on the head in greeting and gave Ash a long kiss. "Told you I'd be just a few minutes."

"Uh-huh," Ash said, looking rather flustered from kissing. That had not been her intention, but it was not a bad result. Misty grinned at him in satisfaction.

"Don't look so smug, you," Ash said without any real annoyance, his eyes darkening deliciously. He got up from his chair to lean over her. She was pretty sure Pikachu fled the room at that point, undoubtedly sensing the mood.

Misty smiled impishly. "What are you planning to do about it?"

Ash didn't answer, just leaned in for another long, smoldering kiss. Misty responded eagerly.

Dinner could wait, after all.

A/N: Thank you for reading! I had actually planned on ending this chapter with Ash and Misty sitting down to eat, but apparently they were in the mood for something else and this ending wrote itself haha. Other than that this was a bit of a set-up chapter, but I hope it was enjoyable nonetheless. I'm very curious to hear your thoughts! Please review!

Thank you!

Recommendation:

Naruto: Human Weakness by Valkyriav. AO3. An in-progress multi-chaptered story about the underappreciated pairing of Sakura and Lee. This continues after the ending of the series and is realistically written about characters with shades of grey and finding a connection with someone. Beautifully done.

If you have a story you want me to recommend, let me know!