Disclaimer: If I owned Pokemon, Gary and Drew would be in the movies as well.

Sorry for the long wait! I hope you enjoy this chapter.

Pink sunlight spills into the room, much like a woman's hair spills over a man's back, and dances upon his eyelids, begging him to wake. He ignores this soft plea, choosing to roll over on his side, away from its beseeching touch, groaning rejection.

A shadow falls over him then, tall, thin and not in the least inclined to beg. The shadow reaches over him and picks up a round alarm clock, shaped like a Nidoqueen, the price tag covering its its left paw. There is a bare sound of a tightening screw, and then, an inhumane screech wrecks through his dreams.

Ash yelps and bolts upright, his sleepy mind colliding into his tortured ears. "Gary!"

Gary smirks at him, and slams the clock back onto the mantelpiece. "Up and about, Ash. It's ten in the morning."

He groans and falls back onto the mess of sheets and blankets. "So? I have nothing to do."

"Pikachu, give him a Thunderbolt."

Ash laughs. "Pikachu won't listen to you, it's-"

Gary covers his ears, watching him convulse on the bed, alight with sizzling electricity, in pure scientific interest. It is the ear-splitting screaming, reduced to a dull keening when filtered through his hands, that lends the laughter to his smile.

"Traitor!" Ash shouts, shaking the gleeful Pokemon.

"Come on, Ash. You have dirty dishes, spilt cereal, an Onix of laundry and a visitor calling in an hour."

Ash glances at him, the sleep gone from his blackened face. "A visitor?" he repeats.

Windchimes tinkle through the house, a quiet orchestra that chimes upstairs along a string of bells, into Ash's bedroom.

"Clever mechanism," Gary remarks. "Looks like he's early. I'll get the door."

"The door?"

Gary glances back at him, his eyes slitted in what suggests cynicism, and it makes Ash bristle in a way that seems oddly familiar. It is familiar in that it laughs at him from the corner of his mind, like a word that is on the tip of your tongue, and yet, no amount of pleading can persuade it to budge.

"Yes, Ash," he realises Gary is saying. "The door. Your house has a door."

"Pikapi."

"Get dressed?" he frowns at Pikachu. "Why would I want to get dressed?"

"Pikapikapi." The Pokemon assumes an imitation of Gary's expression. Ash scowls, and stumbles out of bed. He grabs something, a shirt that is artistically slashed with pink, and pulls it over his head, pushing random buttons through random holes.

He plods downstairs, mouth open in the anticipation of a yawn.

"Sit down," he hears Gary say. "Ash should be down in a minute."

"I must be going soon," an anxious voice trills in reply. "I have so much work to do, and-"

A man, his face as nervous and twitchy as his voice, is sitting at the kitchen counter. He is wearing a neatly pressed suit in the most riddiculous colour, and his tie is such an explosion of shades that it makes his head swim.

"Hi," he says awkwardly.

The man twists around, his mouth open so wide that he must have been preparing to emit no less than an exclamation, and then it snaps shut instantly. "M...Master Ketchum?"

Gary rolls his eyes.

"Master Ketchum, why is t...there cranberry juice all over your shirt? And...and surely...surely those aren't Sesamon Street pants?"

"No, they aren't," Gary says politely before Ash can turn a completely new shade of red. "It's...a premonition of blood that is soon-to-shed and the sweet childishness of murder committed in the victim's home."

Ash cringes.

The man nods, rather ambiguosly.

"Master Ketchum," he twittered, holding out a trembling hand. "I am Shane Quitcher, your Pokemon agent."

"Agent?" he repeats, trying to hide his confusion behind a too-bright smile. He shakes the man's hand enigmatically, and Shane's anxious expression twists into a look of pain. He takes his hand back quickly.

"Yes, agent. I am here to discuss a proposal with you."

Was the pace too slow? Should I pick it up a bit? Please review!