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10:08 PM
The clock ticked louder at night. Misty counted each second like it was a personal insult.
Tick.
That was another fraction of her life wasted staring into the dark.
Tick.
That was sixty seconds closer to a match that felt less like a sporting event and more like an impending execution.
Her blanket twisted around her legs, damp with sweat. She kicked it off with a muffled groan and stared at the ceiling, where a single crack split the plaster like a lightning bolt.
Tomorrow’s battle replayed behind her eyes—every possible misstep, every flubbed command, every scenario where her strategy crumbled like dry sand.
The Cerulean Gym’s reputation hung on her shoulders, a heavy, suffocating mantle. She wasn’t just Misty anymore; she was the Gym Leader chosen to represent the region in this exhibition, and the weight of it was compressing her ribs.
Ash shifted beside her, his breathing steady and infuriatingly calm. They had bagged a cheap twin-bed room at a lakeside inn, forcing them to share a mattress while Brock claimed the small cot across the room. Ash was curled on his side, one arm flung over Pikachu’s sleeping form.
The sight made her chest tighten with a volatile mix of envy and fondness. He’d fall asleep anywhere, anytime, like it was nothing. He could sleep through a hyper beam.
“You’re thinking too loud,” Ash mumbled into his pillow.
Misty froze. The room was dead silent save for the rhythmic rattling of Brock’s snoring across the hall.
She turned her head slowly. Ash rubbed his face against the rough cotton pillowcase and squinted at her through the gloom, his dark hair a bird's nest of chaotic spikes.
“You’re gonna burn a hole in the ceiling,” he whispered, the corner of his mouth twitching with a faint, sleepy smirk.
She exhaled through her nose, turning her face back toward the plaster. “Shut up.”
He sat up, stretching until his shoulders popped with a distinct sound. Pikachu grumbled at the loss of his pillow but didn’t wake, merely curling tighter into a yellow ball of fluff.
Ash looked down at her, his eyes adjusting to the dim moonlight filtering through the threadbare curtains.
“Want to go fishing?” Ash asked, as casually as if he’d suggested a midnight snack. “Lake’s quiet at night.”
Misty blinked. The idea was stupid. It was objectively ridiculous.
They had a battle in, she checked the glowing hands of the small alarm clock on the nightstand, exactly nine hours.
The tournament gates opened early. But the walls of the room felt like they were closing in, the air smelled stale with old carpet and anxiety, and her heart was beating a frantic rhythm against her ribs.
“Fine,” she said, her voice a sharp whisper.
Ash grinned. That wide, unfiltered expression that always made him look entirely reckless. And slid out of bed.
His bare feet hit the floorboards with a soft, hollow thud. He crept over to the wooden chair by the corner, rummaged through the pile of discarded laundry, and tossed her a jacket. It was his old, oversized traveling coat.
When she caught it, it smelled like dirt, cedar wood, and old rain.
She hesitated, looking at the worn fabric, then pulled it on over her tank top.
11:37 PM
The jacket sleeves swallowed her wrists entirely. They crept past Brock’s room, his deep, resonant snores actually rattled the doorframe, and crept down the creaking stairs of the inn.
Every board seemed to scream under their weight, but they made it to the front door without alerting the innkeeper. Ash shouldered the heavy oak door open, releasing them into the night.
Misty inhaled sharply. The air outside was cool and thick with the scent of wet grass and distant pine, a sharp contrast to the stuffy room.
It was the kind of quiet that pressed against her eardrums, immense and velvety.
Ash reached into the umbrella stand by the door where they’d stashed their gear and handed her a fishing rod.
It was one of his—the cork grip worn smooth by years of calloused hands, the reel slightly loose but well-oiled. They picked their way down a narrow dirt path to the lakeshore.
The moon was a massive, luminous pearl high in the sky, painting the water silver. The surface was fractured only by the occasional ripple of a water-type breaking for air.
Misty dug her toes into the mud at the edge of the bank. It squelched, cold and yielding, oozing between her toes. Behind them, the trees whispered as a gentle breeze stirred the leaves.
“So,” Ash said, breaking the silence. He cast his line with a lazy, practiced flick of his wrist. The weights whined through the air before hitting the water with a clean plop. “What’s eating you?”
Misty watched her own lure fly into the dark, a tiny speck of red and white plastic disappearing into the obsidian water.
She could lie.
She could tell him she was just restless, or that the bed was uncomfortable.
But the night stretched endlessly in front of them, the water was hypnotic, and the truth sat heavy and sour behind her teeth.
“What if I lose?” The words came out too small, cracking at the edges. She cleared her throat, trying to inject some of her usual steel into her tone. “It’s just—this tournament. It’s big, Ash. There are scouts from the Indigo Plateau. If I mess up, everyone’s going to say the Cerulean Gym is just a joke again. That my sisters were right to leave it to me because it doesn’t matter.”
Ash shrugged, not even looking back at her. His eyes were fixed on the silver line of his float. “Then you lose.” He reeled in slightly, the mechanical click of the reel humming in the night air. “And you get up and kick their butt next time.”
She scoffed, a bitter sound. “Easy for you to say. You don’t have a reputation to maintain. You just wander from region to region, resetting your clock.”
He grinned, crooked and completely unfazed by her bite. “Yeah. Because it’s true, Mist. Losing sucks. Trust me, I know better than anyone how much it stinks to watch someone else take the trophy. But it doesn’t change who you are. It doesn’t mean your Pokémon are weak.”
Something bumped her line.
Misty tensed, her fingers tightening on the cork handle—but it was just a nibble, a curious Remoraid or a small Magikarp, gone as quick as it came.
She exhaled a long breath she hadn't realized she was holding, her shoulders slumping.
The lake lapped at their ankles, a rhythm like a slow heartbeat.
1:00 AM
By exactly one in the morning, the damp cold of the lake had begun to seep through Misty’s jeans.
Ash leaned back against a large, smooth boulder, propping himself up on his elbows while his rod rested securely in a fork of wood he’d jammed into the mud.
“Remember that time you beat me with Staryu?” Ash asked suddenly, his voice echoing softly over the water. “Right after I got Totodile?”
Misty blinked, turning her head to look at him through the dark. “You were obnoxious about that. You whined for three days straight that Totodile’s type advantage should have given you the win.”
“I was pissed,” he corrected, laughing freely, the sound rich and warm. “I thought I was untouchable after the Orange Islands. But you know what? It made me better. Every time you beat me, it forced me to actually look at my strategy instead of just yelling louder.”
He reached out and nudged her ankle with his bare foot, his skin rough and surprisingly warm against her cold skin. “You’re already better than them, Misty. You don’t need to prove anything to scouts or your sisters. So just… do that. Be the person who kicked my butt.”
She stared at him.
The moonlight caught the sharp edges of his face, the stubborn line of his jaw, the dark, earnest eyes that never knew how to look away from a challenge.
It was his stupid, earnest face, and suddenly, the tightness that had been strangling her chest since yesterday morning unraveled completely.
“Ugh,” she said, looking away quickly to hide the sudden heat in her cheeks. “You’re the worst motivational speaker in the world.” But her lips curved upward, a genuine smile breaking through the exhaustion.
They lapsed into a deep silence, the kind that only existed between people who had walked miles of dirt roads together, who knew exactly how the other took their eggs and how they looked when they were entirely defeated.
Misty watched the water, her reflection fractured and reformed with every ripple. Something deeper beneath the surface flickered, a long, dark shadow darting between the moonlit strands of algae. She wondered what Pokémon might be watching them back from the depths, keeping their secrets.
Ash’s fingers brushed hers as he passed her a metal thermos he’d smuggled out in his coat pocket. The tea inside was lukewarm and violently sweet, the way he always made it—practically half sugar packets from whatever diner they’d passed. She took a tentative sip anyway, letting the cloying heat bloom across her tongue.
“You’re disgusting,” she muttered, though she drank half of it in one long, greedy gulp to chase away the chill.
“Liar,” he said, bumping his shoulder against hers.
His skin was radiating heat, even through the thin cotton of his shirt, warming her side where they touched. “Brock says you steal all the sugar packets at diners anyway. You’re just mad I got to them first.”
“That’s an absolute lie, I only take the—”
She cut herself off as her fishing line jerked violently. The wooden rod didn't just twitch; it nearly leapt out of her hands, the reel screaming as the line tore out into the lake at a terrifying speed.
“Oh, you’re mine,” she hissed, her competitive instinct overriding her exhaustion in a split second. She braced her bare feet deep into the freezing mud, leaning her weight backward.
The water twenty yards out churned violently, a furious white splash arcing through the air, catching the silver moonlight.
Whatever was on the other end of that line fought like it had a personal grudge against the concept of being caught.
Ash scrambled up, kicking over the metal thermos in his haste. The remaining tea spilled into the dirt, forgotten. “Holy—is it a Gyarados?!”
“Shut up and help!” Misty gritted her teeth, her forearm muscles burning as the rod bent into a dangerous, terrifying arc. The line hissed as it cut through the water.
Ash didn't hesitate. He lunged forward, grabbing the rod above her grip. His hands overlapped hers, rough and broad, covering her smaller, cold fingers with a sudden shock of solid warmth. Together, they yanked backward with a coordinated shout.
A flash of silver erupted from the lake. Misty barely had time to register the Pokémon’s sleek, torpedo-like body before it twisted midair with terrifying agility and spat a high-pressure jet of water directly into Ash’s face.
He sputtered, staggering back into the mud, but his hand never left hers, holding the line taut by sheer stubbornness.
The Pokémon hit the shallows with a thunderous, heavy splash. It wasn’t a Gyarados.
It was a Sharpedo, its scarred, blue-and-yellow snout glistening in the moonlight, its small, red eyes locked onto them with pure malice. It immediately lunged forward, using its powerful tail to propel its bulk through the shallow water toward the bank.
Misty barely dodged its snapping, triangular jaws, the teeth clicking together like iron shears inches from her knee. “Oh, hell no—Staryu, now!”
With her free hand, she unclipped the Poké Ball from her belt. Her toss was clumsy because of the mud, but the starfish materialized in a burst of brilliant white light, its golden body slicing through the damp air like a heavy discus.
“Hah!” Staryu’s central gem flashed a dangerous, warning red.
Sharpedo recoiled, screeching a low, grating sound as Staryu’s hardened points scored deep along its scarred flank, forcing it back into deeper water.
Ash wiped a hand across his dripping face, his hair plastered to his forehead, grinning wildly like a lunatic. “Okay,” he gasped, shaking the lake water from his eyes, “this is way better than sleeping.”
Misty would’ve punched him if she weren’t already laughing, a breathless, adrenaline-fueled sound.
The Sharpedo circled them in the shallows, its high dorsal fin cutting through the silver water like a literal blade. Adrenaline sang in her veins, hot and electric, completely erasing the ghost of her earlier anxiety.
Maybe, just maybe, this chaotic madness was exactly what she’d needed.
3:45 AM
Staryu spun in place, its core pulsing a rhythmic, steady red as it readied another attack. The Sharpedo wasn't backing down; it charged again, then veered abruptly at the last second, its massive tail kicking up a literal wall of icy lake water.
Misty threw her arm up to shield her face, but the freezing spray still drenched her from head to toe, plastering her hair to her cheeks.
Through stinging, salt-free eyes, she saw the dark shape of the Pokémon barrel past Staryu, targeting the easier prey on the bank. It went straight for Ash.
He dove sideways, hitting the soft mud with a wet, heavy smack. Pikachu, who had apparently followed them at some point or been woken by the noise, was suddenly wide awake on a nearby rock, his cheeks crackling with yellow electricity.
“Thunderbolt—no, wait!” Ash coughed, spitting out a mouthful of lake water as he scrambled onto his hands and knees. “The water's wet! It's everywhere! Pikachu, don't! You’ll fry us too!”
Pikachu’s cheeks sparked indignantly, his ears pinning back, but he held the electrical charge back, stamping his little feet in frustration cutely.
Misty seized the tiny opening. “Staryu, Rapid Spin—now!”
Her starfish streaked forward, a high-speed blur of whirling points that kicked up its own vortex of water. The hit connected with a solid, fleshy thud.
Sharpedo screeched as the momentum flipped it belly-up in the shallows. Its powerful tail thrashed against the mud, sending huge, thick globs of black muck splattering across the front of Misty’s borrowed jacket.
Ash scrambled back up to his feet, wiping a thick smear of mud from his cheek with his sleeve, only succeeding in spreading it further. “Okay, new plan. We run.”
“Are you kidding?” Misty grabbed his wrist tightly, hauling him behind her as the Sharpedo righted itself with a furious, jaw-snapping shake of its head. The water around it was beginning to foam. “I’m a Water-type master! I’m not losing to some overgrown fish in a public park!”
Ash’s fingers tightened around hers, his grip solid despite the slime. “Uh, Mist? Hate to break it to you, but we are the bait right now. Look at it!”
The Sharpedo lunged again—this time, clearing the water entirely in a powerful, airborne arc. Moonlight glinted off its serrated, multi-layered teeth.
Misty’s breath caught in her throat. The creature was massive, a living engine of muscle and hunger, and they were cornered against the boulder.
Then, from the dark shadow of the tree line behind them, a calm, familiar voice cut through the chaos:
“Aqua Ring.”
A sudden, shimmering sphere of luminous blue water erupted around the Sharpedo mid-leap, catching it in midair. The creature was instantly trapped in a swirling, heavy prison of its own element.
It writhed violently, gnashing its teeth at the fluid barrier, but the magical ring held it suspended, neutralizing its momentum.
Misty whipped around, her heart pounding against her ribs.
A tall figure stood at the edge of the trees, silhouetted by the very first, faint gray light of the approaching dawn.
Brock stepped forward into the open, his arms crossed over his chest, his expression a mix of profound exhaustion and deep annoyance.
“You two do realize the tournament starts in exactly five hours, right?”
4:17 AM
Ash had the decency to look instantly sheepish, pulling his hand back to scratch at his messy hair.
Misty just scowled, though her heart was still racing, shaking the heavy mud from her wet sleeves.
The Sharpedo gave one last, furious thrash before Brock’s invisible command dissipated the Aqua Ring. The large fish dropped back into the lake with a loud, defeated splash.
It lingered for a second, its dorsal fin cutting a slow circle, before it submerged into the dark depths, leaving only widening ripples behind.
Brock sighed heavily, rubbing his temple where a tension headache was clearly forming. “I woke up because the inn’s pipes were rattling, and then I saw Pikachu’s sparks nearly frying the back porch from the window. Again.”
Misty opened her mouth to defend herself. To say it was Ash’s idea, that she was just practicing.
But suddenly, the very first rays of sunlight broke over the eastern mountains. The light hit the water, instantly transforming the black, terrifying lake into a sheet of brilliant, liquid gold.
She blinked, the light stinging her tired eyes. Somewhere deep in the pine trees behind them, a wild Pidgey began its morning song, clear and sweet.
Ash grinned, his face a disaster of dried mud and lake water, but his eyes were bright. Exhaustion and exhilaration were warring across his features, and exhilaration was winning. “Worth it,” he whispered.
Brock groaned, a sound that came from the very bottom of his soul.
He lobbed two thick white towels at their heads with the practiced precision of someone who had dealt with these exact two idiots for years.
One smacked Ash square in the face, wrapping around his head like a turban, while the other draped over Misty's shoulder like a defeated flag.
"You're both filthy," Brock muttered, his eyes cataloging the damage—the black mud caked into Misty’s hair, the thick strands of green lakeweed clinging to the hem of Ash's shirt. Then his gaze shifted downward. His eyebrows lifted slightly.
Ash hadn't let go of Misty's hand.
Even after the danger had passed, his fingers were still locked tightly around hers, his knuckles slightly white from the strain of the battle. Their palms were pressed flat together, sealed by a layer of lake water and drying mud, as if they’d fused during the chaos and forgotten how to separate.
Misty's breath came quick, her pulse visible at the base of her throat. She hadn't noticed. She had been too busy looking at the sunrise.
Brock cleared his throat pointedly, the sound incredibly loud in the morning quiet.
They jerked apart instantly, as if a wild Elekid had just shocked them both.
Ash jumped back, his boots squelching in the mud, and began to scrub the back of his neck with his free hand, suddenly fascinated by a particularly interesting clump of crabgrass by his feet.
Misty busied herself with her towel, wringing a gallon of cold lake water from the hem of her shirt, her cheeks flaring a brilliant, undeniable pink that had nothing to do with the morning sun.
Pikachu, perched comfortably on Brock's shoulder now, flicked one long ear. "Pika-chuuu," he trilled, his voice dripping with an implicit, mocking understanding.
Brock decided, very wisely, to pretend his eyes worked entirely in black and white. "Sharpedo migrations are common in this river basin this time of year," he said, turning back toward the path and nudging a trampled reed with his boot. "You're lucky it didn't decide to take a ten-pound chunk out of your leg, Misty."
"We had it completely handled," Misty snapped, her voice a little too high, a little too fast. She knotted the heavy towel around her shoulders like a set of armor, burying her chin in the terry cloth.
Ash opened his mouth, probably to agree with her, probably to brag, which would only dig their shared hole five feet deeper, when a distant, heavy gong echoed across the water from the northern valley.
The tournament grounds were officially waking up. The generators were humming into life.
Brock sighed, his shoulders dropping. "Come on. You've got exactly"—he checked his silver wrist watch—"four hours to clean up, get some breakfast, and not look like you've been wrestling wild Pokémon in a swamp all night." He turned on his heel, already mentally rearranging his first aid kit for the inevitable muscle sprains and throat lozenges they’d need.
5:15 AM
Ash fell into step beside her on the narrow dirt path, their elbows brushing with every stride. The intense adrenaline of the fight was finally fading, leaving behind a heavy, weightless buzz in her limbs, the kind of exhaustion that made everything feel slightly unreal, like walking underwater.
He bumped his shoulder against hers, a soft, deliberate nudge. "So. Still worried about losing tomorrow? Or, well, today?"
Misty looked at him, really looked at him in the clear, gray light of the dawn.
She saw the dried mud on his chin, the ridiculous way his hair stuck up in three different directions where the towel had ruffled it, and the faint, red scratch on his forearm where he’d hit the rocks to get out of the way of those teeth.
He had jumped between her and a wild predator without a single second of thought. He always did.
Her stomach did a strange, complicated flip, a sudden, warm flutter that felt entirely separate from the tournament nerves.
"Shut up," she said softly, but there was no heat in the words, none of her usual bite.
Behind them, the gold lake glittered in the full morning light, innocent and still, as if it hadn't tried to swallow them alive an hour ago.
Brock didn't turn around as he led them up the hill. He didn't need to. The silence between the two behind him was louder than any stadium crowd she’d ever faced.
Misty's fingers twitched at her side, still humming with the phantom, warm pressure of Ash's grip. The gray mud had dried in the fine creases of her palm, cracking into tiny gray lines when she flexed her fingers.
She glanced sideways out of the corner of her eye, just as Ash's arm swung forward in his regular, loose gait, his rough knuckles grazing the soft back of her wrist.
Before their hands could touch again, Pikachu materialized between them like a small, furry lightning rod. The mouse Pokémon leaped from the grass, planting himself on Ash's shoulder with deliberate precision, his long, lightning-bolt tail flicking Misty directly across the nose as he settled himself.
"Pika-pi," the mouse trilled, his black eyes bright and entirely smug as a Meowth with a bowl of fresh cream. The way his long ears perked left absolutely no room for interpretation: he had seen every single thing from his perch on the rocks.
Misty's face burned hot enough to cook a Magikarp. She jammed her hands deep into the pockets of the oversized jacket, Ash's jacket, she remembered with a sudden jolt, and stared straight ahead at Brock’s broad back. The path back to the old inn had never felt so long.
Brock cleared his throat again, his voice carrying clearly over the morning breeze. "You know," he said, his tone entirely too casual, "the tournament concession stands open in two hours. They serve those big blueberry pancakes."
Ash’s eyes lit up instantly, his stomach letting out a loud, rumbling growl that broke the tension. "Huh? Really? With the whipped cream?"
"Yeah," Brock continued, his eyes fixed firmly on the horizon line. "But the syrup they use is sticky. Really thick stuff. It’s hard to hold onto anything else when your fingers are glued together by accident."
Misty tripped over a completely flat tree root, stumbling into a bush before catching herself.
Pikachu snickered loudly, burying his face in Ash’s collar.
6:07 AM
The inn's yellow porch light came into view, a sickly, pale smear against the bright pink of the true dawn. Misty made a sudden break for it, abandoning her regular pace and stomping up the wooden steps with enough force to rattle the small brass wind chimes hanging from the eaves.
She’d almost reached the screen door, her hand on the brass handle, when Ash's voice stopped her in her tracks:
"Hey. Misty."
She turned around slowly, her hand still on the handle.
He was standing at the bottom of the steps, looking up at her through his messy bangs.
He was grinning, that crooked, slightly sunburned, completely unpolished look that was uniquely Ash, and Pikachu was right beside his head, mimicking his expression whisker-for-whisker.
"The Sharpedo was right," Ash said, his voice dropping into that quiet, familiar tone they only used when Brock was out of earshot. "You do fight dirty when you're cornered."
Something warm, dangerous, and entirely wild unfurled in the center of Misty's chest, chasing away the last lingering thread of her gym leader anxieties.
She leaned her shoulder against the old wooden doorframe, tilting her chin up in that familiar, defiant gesture he knew so well.
"Yeah?" she challenged, a small, sharp smile playing at the corners of her mouth. "And what're you gonna do about it, Ketchum?"
Ash opened his mouth, his eyes widening slightly as if he actually had an answer—
Slam!
The upstairs window directly above the porch flew open with a violent bang.
"IF YOU TWO DON'T GET IN HERE AND SHOWER IN THE NEXT TEN MINUTES," Brock bellowed, his face pushed against the rusted screen, "I'M RELEASING EVERY SINGLE ONE OF YOUR POKEMON INTO THE WILD AND LEAVING FOR PEWTER CITY ALONE."
Pikachu, startled by the volume, let out a defensive spark that shocked Ash directly in the neck on principle.
"Ow! Pikachu!" Ash yelled, hopping on one foot.
Misty bolted inside the screen door, her loud, clear laughter trailing behind her through the quiet hallway of the inn like a strong fishing line.
She made it to the shared bathroom first, locking the heavy brass bolt with a solid click. She leaned against the door, her chest heaving as she tried to catch her breath, her heart hammering a frantic, joyful rhythm.
She reached up to peel off Ash's heavy, mud-splattered jacket, pulling her arms out of the long sleeves—
Clink.
A small, metallic sound echoed in the small room. Something small and circular had fallen from the inner lining of the coat, rolling across the white porcelain of the sink before coming to a stop directly near the brass drain.
Misty’s breath caught in her throat. She froze, her hands suspending the jacket in midair.
There, nestled against the white porcelain, was a small, blue badge shaped like a perfect droplet of water. The Cascade Badge. Her badge.
It wasn’t one of the pristine, new ones she kept in the gym vault for challengers. She knew every scratch on this specific piece of metal. This was the exact badge she had lost three summers ago during that ridiculous, frantic race along the Vermilion City pier, when Ash had accidentally shoved her into the surf while trying to beat a stray Squirtle, and they’d both come up sputtering, soaked, and triumphant. She’d written it off as another casualty of their early, chaotic journeys, assumed it had sunk to the bottom of the ocean.
But here it was. The blue enamel was a little duller now, the silver edges smoothed down from years of being handled, friction-worn by someone’s thumb.
Ash had kept it. He had carried it in his inner pocket through Johto, through Hoenn, through every single mile of dirt road they’d walked apart. All this time.
Misty's fingers trembled slightly as she picked it up from the sink. The metal felt remarkably warm, having absorbed the heat from his chest through the thin lining of the coat.
She felt a sudden, violent urge to open the door and throw it directly at his stupid head, to demand why he’d kept it like some sentimental, ridiculous idiot, but instead, she found her thumb tracing the familiar water-droplet engraving, her movement slow, reverent, and entirely quiet.
The wooden doorknob rattled violently from the outside.
"Misty! Come on! You're hogging all the hot water and the tournament starts soon!" Ash's loud voice cut off abruptly as the old lock gave way slightly, the door creaking open a mere sliver because the latch was loose.
She didn't turn around to face him. She couldn't. But she saw his reflection clearly in the steamed-up mirror above the sink.
Ash was standing in the doorway, his towel over his shoulder, his gaze flicking instantly from the small blue badge held tight in her palm up to her eyes in the glass.
His entire face, from his neck to the tips of his ears, turned a violent, dark scarlet.
The silence between them in the small, steamy bathroom became immense, heavy with three years of unsaid words, shared campfires, and long roads.
Then, his voice came again, so quiet, so soft she almost missed it over the sound of the pipes dripping. "You... you never asked for it back, Mist."
Misty snapped her fingers shut over the piece of metal, the sharp silver edges digging hard into the skin of her palm until it hurt. "You stole it, Ash."
Ash leaned his shoulder against the wooden doorframe, crossing his arms over his chest, trying to look defensive but failing entirely as his eyes remained fixed on her.
The white steam from the hot water tap curled between them like a physical barrier. "You lost it in the ocean. I fished it out."
"That’s semantics and you know it." She turned around fully then, her chin lifted high, her knuckles white around the hidden weight in her hand.
He looked at her, the embarrassment slowly fading from his face, replaced by that familiar, stubborn, deeply knowing grin that always made her want to hit him and kiss him at the exact same time. "You wanna fight about it? Cerulean rules?"
From the hallway outside, Pikachu let out a long, deeply exasperated sigh, facepalming with one small yellow paw.
Brock's deep voice boomed up the stairs like a dynamic punch: "I'M COUNTING TO THREE, YOU ANIMALS! ONE!"
Misty shoved past Ash into the hallway, her shoulder bumping his hard sending him stumbling back half a step into the wall, but not before she caught the sight of his grin widening until his eyes closed.
She jammed the Cascade Badge deep into the pocket of her shorts, the metal burning a literal hole against her thigh all the way back to her small room.
Downstairs, the inn's old dial radio crackled to life with the first loud, brassy theme music of the tournament announcements. The real battle, the one with stadium lights, referees, and cheering crowds, was coming in just a few hours.
And somehow, as she looked down at her muddy hands, this one—this stupid, silent, unacknowledged thing stretching between the two of them in the dawn—felt infinitely more dangerous.