Chapter 1

Vertigo: n. a sensation of motion in which the individual or the individual's surroundings seem to whirl dizzily.

The sky is blue and clear, there are no clouds on sight. The wind is whispering in his direction. He is home. He is finally home after being away all these months. He feels relaxed and peaceful; the air is clean.

He breathes in. He breathes out.

He is standing on the hill, the highest place in town, from this place he can see everything, after all, Pallet Town is very small. He sees the Oak Mansion to the west, several houses to the north and he catches a glimpse of his house in the far northeast.

He feels better now.

"We're home, Pikachu," he says looking down at his friend, who is standing next to him.

"Pikachu!" his pokémon jumps to his shoulder in excitement.

This is the place where it all started. Where he grew up, where he found all his dreams, where he met Pikachu.

This is the place where his life changed once… and will change again… forever.

-o-

He is walking the small streets of Pallet Town with Pikachu still on his shoulder. These streets may not be as modern as the streets he used to walk during his last journey, on the Kalos region but these streets feel somehow safer. He knows this place by heart, after all, he lived all his childhood here.

He approaches his house and sees something he didn't see when he was standing on the hill: there are a couple of men going in and going out of his house, those men are carrying construction materials. Builders? What are they doing to his house?

Confused, he walks towards one that is sitting on the bench outside his house.

"Excuse me, is Delia Ketchum here?" he asks worried. His mom must be there, mustn't she?

"Dylan! Here's a guy looking for the boss! Where is she?" he asks to one of his colleagues that is working on the nearby window.

The boss? The boss of what? He asks himself as he sees the changes those men are doing to his house, the house he grew up in, the house he wanted to spend a month in before he left for his next journey.

But clearly, he wouldn't be able to spend his break days in this house.

Dylan walks out of the house and sees Ash with a confused look.

"Oh! You're her son!" Dylan exclaims surprised.

"I'm Ash." He introduces himself, still confused.

"Your mom should be at the Oak mansion… let's see," he informs and he looks at his watch. "Yes, she should be there, she will come here in about two hours so, you better go to the mansion, do you know how to get there?"

Of course, Ash knows how to get there, is that a joke? He spent lots of his childhood days playing in that mansion, specifically in the lab with all those friendly pokémon.

"Yes, thank you." Ash smiles and says goodbye to those men who are doing God knows to his house.

As he walks down the street, he is still confused. Why did his mom have to remodel their house? Why did she do it without even asking him? It was his house just as much as it was hers! What about his stuff? What about the things in his bedroom? What about his prized possessions?

He tried to calm down.

He breathed in. He breathed out.

His mom must have thought of those things before starting whatever she's planning to do to their house. She must have taken all of Ash's stuff to a safer place, maybe the attic, yes, that was it. She must have stored all his stuff in the attic. His mom was a very intelligent woman, after all.

-o-

Ash stands in front of the Oak mansion. Pikachu jumps off his shoulder to the stairs that lead to the main door.

Ash stands still. He doesn't admit it but he is nervous. His plans didn't include visiting professor Oak so soon, he is nervous because he didn't win the last pokémon League he was in, he was very close, he ended up in the second place.

He knows that professor Oak won't care about it, he has always supported Ash in his main dream of becoming the pokémon Master, but he still feels bad, he was so close… so close.

Ash breathes in. Ash breathes out.

"Pika?" his buddy tilts his head in confusion.

"Let's go, Pikachu." He smiles walking to the door and ringing the bell.

A few seconds pass and no one opens the door. He decides to ring the bell again.

"I'm there! Just a second!" a familiar voice exclaims from the inside. It's not his mother, it's a male voice, but it's too young to be professor Oak.

"Hi!" the voice says opening the door.

Ash recognizes the boy in front of him. He looks exhausted, like he ran a mile to open the door. That boy hasn't seen Ash yet, he is taking a breath, breathing in, breathing out; grabbing the door with his hands and looking to the floor.

"Gary?" Ash asks surprised.

"Ashy-boy?" Gary looks up, surprised.

"Are you okay?"

"Yeah, yeah, come in," Gary sighs, still trying to recover his breath.

Ash looks around the mansion like it's the first time he has ever been there, but he was there lots of time in the past, however everything seems new, though he is sure everything is still the same.

"Oh, right! You must be here because of your mom, I'll go get her," Gary says after he closes the door.

"Wait!" Ash grabs Gary's arm before he takes the stairs.

"Yes?" Gary asks curious.

"Can you explain me what's going on? I mean, with my house being remodeling and my mom staying here," Ash says as he takes a seat on the sofa.

"Wouldn't it be better if she explains it to you herself?" Gary laughs a little.

"Yeah but… she hid it from me, I called her two days ago, and she didn't tell me anything, I mean, she doesn't know that I'm here, I decided to come here to surprise her," Ash says trying to feel better but somehow, he feels bad, bad that his mom didn't tell him about her plans to remodel their house, to change everything.

"Well, I don't know much, just that she's been here for a week, she's staying in one of the rooms in the second floor though most of the afternoon she is at your house, checking that the builders are working fine and all," Gary says without taking a seat. "As for her not telling you… I don't know, sorry".

"I'm probably overreacting, aren't I?" Ash laughs a little.

"Maybe… but still, it's your house just as hers. Honestly, I'd feel angry mostly because of my personal stuff, in case she didn't hide them somewhere."

"That's the thing that's been bothering the most!" Ash exclaims mostly surprised that Gary thought the same as him. "I know it may sound like I am materialist but it's not really that way, I have a lot of memories of my journeys in my room, it's like my sanctuary, you know?"

"Yeah." Gary smiles. "But don't worry, I'm sure your mom kept all your stuff in the attic or somewhere, maybe she brought them here when she came last week, I was in a science congress so when I came home two days after that, she was already living here," Gary explains.

Ash feels better after he listens to Gary's words. At least now his memories of his journeys remain safe. He is sure of that.

"Ash!" Delia exclaims surprised from the top of the stairs.

"Mom!" Ash exclaims just as excited as his mom and he doesn't wait for her to come down, he takes the stairs and they join halfway.

Gary left the room soon after Ash and Delia hugged each other, to give them privacy. He even smiled a little when he saw mother and son hugging, a beautiful reunion.

-o-

Delia explained everything to Ash and of course, she kept all of Ash's stuff in the attic. Ash felt now more than peaceful, he felt better.

She explained that the house was getting old and that she wanted to give it a new essence, that she had always wanted that. She explained to him that the builders would expand the kitchen and the living room, build a small greenhouse in the yard for her to take care of her flowers, and even build a balcony for her room, just because she always wanted one since she was a teenager.

But what surprised Ash the most was that she told him that the builders were also building a small pool in the yard.

"Really? A pool?" Ash asks overexcited.

"I'm still young and I asked to myself… why not?" she giggles.

"Wow, mom, I would have never expected that," he confesses.

She also told him that she had no plans for changing his bedroom, because she had no right to do anything to it without his permission. Now Ash felt better, his mom did think about him. Now he just felt like an idiot for the way he had felt before, when he was walking from his house to the Oak mansion.

"You should have told me you were coming, that way I would have told you all about it."

"I wanted to surprise you." He smiles at her.

"How long are you staying? Two or three days?" she asks as she grabs his son's hat and touches his hair.

"Actually, I want to take a longer break, I'll stay around a couple of weeks, maybe a month or even two," he reveals.

"Oh my!" her tone is not what he expected. "Don't get me wrong, it's just that the house won't be ready in a month, you may have noticed I'm staying here in the mansion, Samuel was so nice to lend me a room, so if you stay, you'd have to take a room here too."

"Seriously?" Ash asks laughing a bit. "I never thought of myself as a guest in the Oak mansion," he sighs. "I don't know, mom… do you think professor Oak will be okay with that?"

"Of course, he will! He isn't here right now but Gary told me he'll be back at night, I'm sure he'll love the idea." She smiles putting the hat back to Ash's hair. "And Gary will like that too!"

Gary. Sure, Gary was kind of friendly when Ash arrived at the mansion… but not the kind of friendly person who would be fine with someone staying in his house for a month… besides, Ash and Gary had their differences… they used to be rivals… used to be… did that mean they weren't now? Or were they?

Ash remembered that the last time he saw Gary, when he was traveling in Sinnoh, Gary said they were friends. Now Ash felt like an idiot again, worrying about things that he didn't have to worry about. Of course, Gary would be fine with him staying… just as long as he didn't bother him that much.

-o-

His mom left to their house, to check the builders and their job so far. She told him to go take the room next to hers, that all the rooms were unlocked, and take a nap. But Ash decided to go see Gary and ask him for staying in the mansion himself. He walked out of the kitchen and into the backyard, full of dozens of pokémon, some of his.

"Pikachu!" Pikachu exclaimed running to the pokémon and started playing with them.

Ash smiled, he took his time to say hi to his friends and then he entered the lab, leaving Pikachu in the backyard.

As he suspected, Gary was there, typing something in his computer. He was now wearing glasses. He had an intellectual look.

"Ashy!" he exclaimed looking up from his computer screen. "Everything okay with your mom?"

Ash was feeling weird… Gary was being kind of nice to him… when they used to fight all the time, but now they were friends… but he didn't feel this weirdness with Brock, or Tracey, or Clemont. Ash decided to blame his lack of sleep or the jetlag for how he was feeling lately.

He really wanted to take a nap and he would have followed his mom's instruction but he just didn't feel right by taking a room without asking Gary first. He would have asked professor Oak but he wasn't at the mansion right then, so he had to go to Gary instead.

Ash smiled "Yeah, everything's fine," he said walking around the lab "What are you doing?" he asked to start some conversation, he didn't want to ask for the room without having at least talked a little to Gary.

"I'm doing a research on the eevolutions," Gary said typing something in his keyboard.

"Really? It sounds very interesting," Ash said genuinely interested, he took a chair and he sat across from Gary.

"Well, right now I'm just reading some articles, it's rather boring, but I hope to start experimentation next week."

Ash was shocked "Experimentation?"

Gary laughed "Your reaction tells me you think I'm going to do mutations, you're such a loser," he said as he took off his glasses. "In some kind of way I'm going to do that but trust me, no one will get hurt. I'm planning on synthesizing a new stone that will make Eevee evolve into a new pokémon, sounds kind of revolutionary, I know."

"Wow! Do you really think it is possible?" Ash asked caught by the topic as if he were a little kid caught by the glimpse of candy.

"That's why I'm reading these articles, I already have enough evidence but I want to have a little more."

Ash's eyes were wide opened. "It's like… it's like you're going to create yourself a new pokémon, you'll be like a god."

Gary laughed at that comment.

"Maybe. I had never thought of it that way."

There was some silence until Gary decided to say something to keep up with the conversation.

"So, you're staying here?"

Ash blushed. "Can I?" He was nervous, his stomach was crazy.

"Of course, Ashy, there's plenty of rooms in here. You must want to take the room next to your mother's." Gary assumed.

Ash thought of it for a second. It's not like he didn't want to be close to his mom but taking the room next to hers didn't feel like a good idea for some reason.

"I was thinking of a room in the third floor, if it's possible."

"Sure, you can take the one that's next to mine. I feel lonely in the third floor because my grandpa's room is in the second floor and now your mom is living in another one in the second floor."

Ash liked the idea. "Sounds great!"

"So, how long are you staying? Two or three days?" Gary asked with curiosity.

By hearing from both of his mother and Gary that they thought he would stay just for a few days, Ash couldn't stop from feeling guilty, guilty of not spending enough time when he got back from his journeys to Pallet Town, he wanted this break to be different, and he was also tired from his last trip, that's why he decided to stay longer this time.

"I was thinking about a month or two," he finally revealed.

Gary was surprised. "A month? Two?"

"Is there a problem?"

"Of course not!" Gary answered way too fast but none of them noticed.

"Thank you for letting me stay here, and my mom." Ash smiled.

"No problem, Ashy-boy, besides, since your mom is here, she makes breakfast, lunch and dinner, and man! She's a cooking goddess!" Gary's eyes shone.

Now Ash laughed.

Gary stood up. "You must be tired; shall I show you your room?"

Ash stood up too. "Thank you."