"I can't believe you already fucked up this bad," Green mused as he used a knife to poke at the blackened dish. "It's beyond recognition."

"How many tomatoes lost their lives for you to conduct your disgusting experiments, Daisy?" Gary chimed in as he peered over his brother's shoulder.

Their sister glowered.

"It was an accident," she stressed. "I went outside to water the plants and when I came back inside the oven was… it was smoking."

"How can you fuck up that badly, though?"

"Even Leaf manages to leave it looking sort of organic," Green laughed. "This looks like something you'd see floating around in space."

The lasagne did in fact look vaguely like a meteorite. Daisy looked down at their former dinner in shame. She would need to throw it all away as well, the lasagne crusted too firmly onto the dish to be salvageable.

"The oven looks okay," Gary observed as opened it. "Nothing a good clean won't fix."

Green wrinkled his nose. "Pass."

"I wouldn't want you to clean to oven," his sister grumbled. "The last time you cleaned the bathroom there was mould growing the next day. Mould, Green. Maybe you can do it, Gary–"

"He sabotaged himself," Gary said with a cheeky grin. "He knew that if he screwed up bad enough you'd never ask him to clean the bathroom again."

Daisy spun her head around to glare at Green while Green did the same towards Gary.

"I told you to keep your mouth shut about that!" Green cried, while his brother shrugged.

"I didn't wanna clean the oven."

"Well I don't want to, either!"

"You idiots," Daisy growled. "I was going to clean it anyway since I'm the one who burnt dinner."

Her brothers deflated and wore identical grins.

"Whatever you say, sis."

"Fine with me."

Daisy sighed before she shooed them out of the kitchen.

"Go and make yourselves useful. Put away the plates I'd set out on the dining table. I guess I'll just order pizza or something."

Green beamed. "Awesome. Make sure you order a cheese one though, Red doesn't eat anything else."

"Got it," Daisy drawled as she turned back towards the oven. "Now go. Make sure Grandpa's still keeping himself out of trouble."

"Will do," he chimed as he left the room.

Daisy stared at the oven for a second with a furrowed brow. She'd never cleaned the oven before since they usually hired people to come in every now and then to spring clean the entire house top to bottom. She always felt a bit guilty watching the cleaners work but it wasn't like they couldn't afford it. Professor Samuel Oak was a man who had revolutionised pokémon training and even though his mind wasn't what it used to be, his name alone was more than enough to keep them healthily funded.

Not to mention that all three of the siblings had their own incomes coming in. Daisy was becoming something of an impressive figure in pokémon medicine herself, and her track record in the contests that Kanto had hosted were nothing to scoff at.

Green was doing more than okay for himself. No one ever said that gym leaders were underpaid, although from what Daisy could figure he wasn't spending his wages on much aside from camping equipment and hair gel. She assumed that both were for the benefit of Red.

Gary was only a researcher in training, but he still brought in a good salary. Enough to fuel his car, at the very least. Though, speaking of her brother…

"Why are you still here?" she asked, not bothering to turn around. The oven needed her full attention.

"You're going to have better luck just demolishing the whole kitchen and starting new," Gary said with a grin. She couldn't see him, but she could hear it, the smug idiot. "It's really just a big mess."

"Oh, shut up. I'm not getting a new kitchen. I just need to find the oven… stuff."

"You're a pokémon doctor and you don't know how to clean an oven?"

"I've cleaned plenty of ovens!" Daisy exclaimed. "I'm just a bit rusty."

Gary raised an eyebrow before walking over to the pantry, coming out with baking soda and vinegar.

"Here. It'll work," he said as he handed it over.

Daisy gaped. "How in the world do you know how to clean an oven?"

He shrugged. "I'm still a junior at the lab. Being Samuel Oak's grandson doesn't give me shit if I can't prove myself first. So I've been cleaning boy for a while now."

Daisy frowned. "That's not very fair."

"Doesn't bother me," he replied casually. "I clean the equipment and the break room and get to research anything I like. It's a fair enough trade."

Daisy sighed and shook her head before beginning to measure out the ingredients.

"I got the apples from the Ketchums, by the way," Gary said and gestured to the back door. "They were heavy as fuck too."

"Language, and thank you," Daisy said.

"Yeah, you better thank me," Gary said, and Daisy raised an eyebrow. "It was tense over there. Delia didn't even offer me any cookies. She always offers me cookies."

"Strange." Daisy hummed. "I thought she would've been excited about having all her kids under one roof for the first time in years."

"Me too, but you could cut the tension with a knife," he said, frowning. "I didn't see Red either."

Daisy frowned as well before shaking her head. "Hopefully they'll be okay by tonight. At the very least Delia won't have to cook. Hopefully a decent apple pie will make up for us having pizza for dinner."

"Still, you should've asked Delia to make the pie," her brother commented. "Her baking is so good; it's no wonder Mimey's overweight."

"That's mean."

"It's true! Gramps gave Delia a special diet to give to him but I think she's sabotaging him."

"Delia's not sabotaging Mimey," Daisy said as she stuck her hand in the oven, testing the heat. "She loves Mimey."

"You're probably going to have to use the lab's oven for the apple pie," Gary said. "There's no way you can get that clean in time."

Daisy sighed and closed the oven. "You're right. Okay, help me take the apples over to the lab."

Gary groaned. "Seriously? I just carried them all the way over from Ash's. They're heavy."

"You'll live," Daisy replied as she gathered the rest of the ingredients in her arms. "Let's go."

—

"Is Red home yet?" Delia asked Ash as he laced his shoes up by the front door. "I tried his phone but I get that beeping noise. That means it's turned off, right?"

Misty nodded as she slipped on her own shoes. "If he doesn't have a voicemail, it'll beep."

"It wouldn't be weird for him not to answer his phone though," Ash grumbled as Pikachu clambered up his arm and onto his shoulder. He steadied the pokémon as he stood up and gave him a scratch behind his ear. "He never has anything to say anyway."

It was a testament to how worried and distracted Delia was when she didn't scold her youngest son. She bit her lip instead and looked outside with a furrowed brow as the sun finally set.

Misty sent Ash a glare when Delia returned to the house.

"She's worried about her son, you dumbass," she whispered.

"I'm her son, too." Ash replied petulantly.

"I'm her favourite anyway," Leaf announced as she left the house, her twin brother hot on her heels. "Everyone knows that."

"You are so not her favourite," Fire countered as he laced up his shoes. "She totally loves me most."

"It's a commonly known fact that children and parents relate best to those of the same sex, so," Leaf said as she adjusted her hat, "as her only daughter, it's only natural that she loves me the most."

"No way," Ash exclaimed, jumping in place. Pikachu held on tightly to his shoulder. "I'm the youngest, she totally loves me best!"

"Actually," Delia interrupted as she walked out the front door, her purse in her hands. "My favourite is Mimey," she said as said pokémon followed her out and handed her a basket covered with a cloth.

Ash frowned. "Mimey isn't allowed to be your favourite. He's a pokémon."

Delia sent Ash a pointed look. "Mimey is around more than my own children, so why can't he be my favourite?"

"Ooh, want me to get Staryu for that burn?" Misty teased as Ash pouted.

"No, thanks. I'm fine," he replied sarcastically as his siblings laughed.

"Sorry, sweetie," Delia cooed and smooched him on the cheek, much to his embarrassment. "Don't forget that mother loves you."

"Yeah, yeah," he muttered as she let go of him.

"Okay, troops! Let's go!" Delia announced as she set off down the path from her house towards the Oak residence, waving at Mimey as they left.

She had always counted herself lucky to live in Pallet Town where her friends were only a short walk away. Everything was only a few minutes away in Pallet, after all. On the days where she missed her children the most, it was comforting to know she could go on an easy walk or even a bike ride to the laboratory and have tea with the professor or Daisy if she wanted.

Delia looked out towards the ocean, barely seeing a glimpse of the charred remains of Cinnabar Island. The sun had set half an hour ago, so the bright summer moonlight guided them where the needed to go. It bounced off the water soothingly. It were times like these that she could hardly believe she missed Goldenrod anymore. Sure, the shopping and people were nice, and her father and aunt still lived in the city, but the calm serenity of Pallet Town had done more for her personal health and wellbeing than anything else could.

Although some days…

"Want me to take that, Ma?" Leaf asked, startling Delia out of her thoughts. She gestured to the basket Delia was carrying.

Delia looked back. Fire was busy doing something on his new tablet – the phone and Pokédex hybrid that Professor Oak was having him test out – while Ash and Misty hung at the very back.

"Oh, thanks honey!" she gushed as she turned back and handed the basket to her daughter. "That thing is heavy, and my back isn't what it used to be."

Leaf smiled and shook her head as she peeked into the basket. "Wine and cheese?"

Delia nodded. "Mhmm! Last time Samuel came by the café for brunch he mentioned that they're his favourites," she said with a smile, not quite hiding the blush from Leaf. "At least, I think that's what he said. I hope I didn't get it wrong…"

Leaf smiled deviously. "I'm sure it wouldn't matter anyway, Ma, as long as it was you who bought it."

Delia's blush deepened as she made a half-hearted dismissal.

"Hey!" Ash exclaimed from that back, earning a glare from Leaf. "Where's Silver and Lyra? Aren't they coming?"

"They're going to skipping dinner," his mother said with the smallest hint of disapproval in her tone. "They said they were still tired from the journey."

Ash scrunched up his nose. "I came here all the way from Unova and they're complaining about walking from Johto?"

"You took a plane, you dork," Misty teased. "Then we biked from Viridian – it was hardly an exhausting journey."

"Yeah," Fire piped up. "Lyra said they were near Cianwood City when Ma called. They had to take a ferry back to the mainland, and then they had to bike all the way from Olivine to get back."

"They still barely made it," Leaf chimed in.

"I guess the train would have been a pain to catch as well," Misty hummed. "They would've had to gone from Olivine to Goldenrod, then Saffron to Pallet."

"Still," Delia interrupted. "I don't quite agree with them staying home alone. There are a lot of unsavoury people around here, you know!"

"I don't think Pallet has enough people to have a rotten egg, Ma," Fire drawled, staring intensely at his screen. "It's probably statistically impossible."

"False!" Leaf exclaimed as she spun around and pointed a finger at him, continuing to walk backwards. "Green is the rotten egg!"

"Or Gary," Ash muttered.

"Oh," Delia sighed, "they're such sweet boys, though. When Green's in town he always helps me with my groceries."

"That's because he's skipping work," Leaf grumbled, and nearly tripped over a rock. Fire stifled his laughter.

"I'm totally going to tell Green you tripped," he laughed and started to run. Leaf made a sputtering sound before taking off after him, the big laboratory on the hill in sight.

"Be careful of the wine, sweetie!" Delia called out as the basket swung in Leaf's arms. She turned back to Ash and Misty. "Do you two want to run ahead, too? I don't mind."

"We're okay," Misty replied before Ash could. She snuck a side look at him, but noticed he was smiling.

"Yeah, we're okay, Ma."

Delia smiled and turned back around, and Misty felt her face heat up. In the back of her mind, maybe she was thinking he wasn't as big of a child as she always thought he was. She would have denied it if anyone had asked, however.

"Hey," Ash said abruptly as he stopped, forcing his mother and Misty to as well. "Do you smell smoke?"

—

"So Green might have burnt dinner," Daisy said nonchalantly. "It's no big deal – I've forgiven him. I ordered pizza instead."

"Yes!" Ash exclaimed. "I hate lasagne!"

Misty shot him a look and refrained from grabbing his ear. He wasn't Brock, but old habits die hard.

"What about the apple pie?" Leaf whined as she walked into the lounge, Fire hot on her heels. The twins sat themselves down onto the couch like they belonged there.

Ash watched them with a careful eye. They did actually look like they had spent a lot of time at the Oak home. He wasn't aware that they spent that much time in Pallet. As far as he knew, they spent most of their time travelling. Unlike Red who secluded himself on a mountain ten months of the year, and Ash who blew through region after region, he was under the impression that Leaf and Fire spent months in one region at a time.

Although, now that he thought about it, he did get a lot of pictures from the twins of Pallet – more so than any other city or region – and Red often did occasionally down from Mt. Silver because of whatever the hell was going on between him and Green.

Hell, even Silver visited once and while. Ash was probably the only one of them who'd only been home a handful of times since he had started his journey.

"Hey," Misty startled him out of his reverie by placing a concerned hand on his shoulder, "are you okay? You drifted off there for a second."

Ash looked around. Daisy and his mother were gone, while Gary had joined the twins in the lounge.

He felt Misty's concerned look, along with Leaf's puzzled one. Fire and Gary were talking together animatedly.

"Green?" he asked as he grabbed Misty's hand and pulled her over to the other couch, attempting to stop the flush from climbing higher up his neck.

"He just left to go pick up the pizza, but who knows how long he'll fuck around," Gary answered. "But hey – where's Red? That should bring him back quick enough."

Leaf and Fire shared a look between them, while Ash could feel his previous good mood start to falter.

"You know how Red is," Leaf said quickly, "Always on the move!"

Gary frowned in concentration. "But isn't he like… the opposite?"

"Yeah, Leaf," Fire replied with a cheeky grin. "Red never moved around much. He's kinda like a slakoth."

"That's what I thought." Gary nodded. "I've known him my whole life and I think I've only seen him in like three places."

Leaf elbowed Fire as she blushed. "I meant metaphorically."

"Who cares?" Ash asked, feigning disinterest. "He'll come back eventually. Not that he'd be much fun anyway."

Leaf pursed her lips and gave Ash and pointed stare, but said nothing. Misty and Fire were equally silent, refusing to look at either of the siblings. Gary was oblivious.

"So," Misty cut in quickly as Ash's face continued to sour. "What've you been up to lately, Gary?"

"Not much," he replied slowly. "Just research, like usual. I've been doing some stuff with medicine with Daisy, too."

"That's cool!" she exclaimed. She could see that Leaf had winced out of the corner of her eye. "Really… cool."

Ash rolled his eyes – and made sure everyone in the room was aware of his displeasure – before getting up.

"I'm going for a walk," he grumbled loudly, and stomped back out the front door.

"Who pissed in his cereal?" Leaf muttered and hunched over as Fire grimaced.

"Hey, dude – you still got those video games?" he asked.

Gary – once again largely oblivious to the tension in the room – shrugged.

"I think they're in Green's room. I can go have a look? They're pretty old, though."

As Fire and Gary left the room, Misty put an awkward hand on a clearly distressed Leaf's shoulder. Both girls were exuding an air of discomfort.

Misty rarely had to comfort people. She usually left any consoling of defeated trainers to her sister Daisy, or to Tracey if he was in Cerulean – he had a certain way with women that would have disturbed Misty if he were anyone else – and she had also never had to help her sisters though a breakup, for the obvious reasons. Misty seriously doubted that any of her sisters had been broken up with in their entire lives.

Not to mention that Leaf's discomfort stemmed from a much greater, more serious problem than a lost match or a break up.

"It's okay," Misty said quietly. "Ash is just… y'know. He's Ash. Once he gets something into his head it's hard for him to let go of it. He's probably just angry now because he was angry before."

Leaf was silent for a few moments, only the sound of her soft breathing could be heard.

"But I don't know," she murmured. "I don't."

"You don't know what?" Misty asked, perplexed.

"I don't know Ash," Leaf said with more conviction. "I don't know my own brother – I don't know most of my brothers. I think that if Fire and I weren't twins, I wouldn't even know him!"

Misty probably would have worried more about what Leaf was saying if the girl wasn't showing the telltale signs of someone about to burst into tears.

"Hey, hey, it's okay," she tried to soothe. "Don't cry, please? Please, seriously. I'm not good with—"

"I've lived most of my life and I don't even know them!" As Leaf continued to vent, tears started to drip down her face.

"Hey, whoa," Gary said as he and Fire entered the room. Fire took one look at his weepy sister before he jumped over and wrapped his arms around her. "What the hell did you do, Gingerbread?"

"Nothing!" Misty yelled, exasperated. She shot an apologetic look Leaf's crumpled form before making her way to the door. "I'm going to go find Ash and see if he's okay," she said before she escaped out the front door.

"Don't make him cry too!" Gary yelled out after her.

—

The house was disturbingly quiet when Green returned home. Considering that it should've been loud with the bustling activity of two big families – each with their own obnoxious embarrassments – he was surprised he could only hear the telltale sounds of a video game blaring from the living room.

"Where the fuck is everybody?" he asked his brother and Fire, who were both frantically mashing the buttons on the ancient controllers. "I thought it'd be a zoo."

"It is a zoo. A depressed zoo," Gary droned, not taking his eyes away from the tv.

"A zoo where all the pokémon just want to be back in the wild, struggling to find food and killing each other," Fire continued. "That kind of zoo."

"We don't even have zoos in Kanto anymore," Green muttered to himself as he walked into the kitchen, arms laden with the food.

"Thank god for that, too!" Gary yelled after him as he disappeared. "Horrible places they are!"

"I got the pizza," Green announced to the two people in the kitchen. Delia and the professor were sitting at the kitchen table, a bottle of wine sitting between the two of them. Two glasses sat already nearly empty, Green noticed warily. "Be careful with mixing your drinks, Gramps. You've already had some today," he warned.

The professor waved him off and reached for the bottle.

"Green!" Delia exclaimed. "Come here, sweetie. Give me a hug – I swear I haven't seen you for years!"

"You always say that…" he muttered, but gave her an awkward hug regardless.

"Samuel and I were just talking about you!" she said and shared a look with his grandfather. The professor gave Delia a cheeky grin as he poured his wine.

"Oh goody," Green deadpanned as he put the hot pizza boxes on the kitchen counter. "Only good things I hope."

"Of course, of course! Samuel was just telling me how accomplished you're becoming as a gym leader – such an impressive title, really, but to be one of the best!" Delia cooed. "Oh, I'm so proud of you!"

Green was never going to be the kind of guy who pulled the sympathy card. Even when he was a hot-headed little shit of a kid who would've done anything to win he still wouldn't have pulled the sympathy card – he especially would've never pulled the orphan card. He wasn't that much of an asshole to begin with, but it was also because he never actually felt like an orphan in the first place.

Even though the professor wasn't entirely there anymore he had always been an attentive grandfather, and having an older sister like Daisy helped – even though she was only a few years older than Green – so he never felt like he was lacking in the parental department. Sure there were times when he would have loved to have parents, and he would be lying if he said he never felt their absence, but he was young when they died and he had moved past their deaths. He had put it behind him.

But there was something about Delia Oak that exuded motherly love. Even with four – completely and utterly equally troubled – children of her own, she still found the love to make sure another kid felt happy and appreciated. Green liked that.

"Thanks, Delia," he said with a smile, and then felt the delayed embarrassed flush rise up his neck. Green cleared his throat awkwardly as both Delia and his grandfather looked at him.

"So, where's everyone else?" he asked. "I tried asking the dorks in the lounge but they were useless."

"Leaf is with Daisy in her room, I think, and I'm not sure where Ash and Misty have gotten off to," Delia said thoughtfully. "Maybe they've gone for a walk? It's such a lovely night."

"Maybe they've snuck away for a secret rendezvous?" Professor Oak said, causing Delia to giggle.

"Oh, Samuel, they're just kids! My Ash is a good boy, too."

"I remember what I used to get up to…"

Realising that his grandfather was about to launch into one of his stories – and seeing that Delia was looking at him with rapt attention – Green decided to go upstairs to get the girls for dinner.

The Oak family house was a decent enough size. It was close enough to the lab too, which made everything a lot easier for all of them. But the house itself had been built when his grandfather had first started his rise to fame. With the invention of the television and Samuel Oak's promotion from a simple professor of pokémon to the Pokémon Professor, the Oak family gained a healthy amount of money to put towards creating a family home for everyone.

Daisy told him once that their mother used to joke that they were like a family on an old television show who owned a tauros ranch and had heaps of money to waste, although she could never remember the name of it.

The Oak family home was easily the biggest in Pallet. Considering that most of the houses in Pallet Town were small villas with two or three bedrooms, it was hardly a difficult feat. The Oak home had six bedrooms all up, although two of them were never used and another two were more or less storage for two very lazy boys who weren't entirely ready to commit to leaving home. The only rooms in the house that were consistently occupied were Daisy's and the professor's.

Since Daisy spent the most time in the house – which still wasn't a huge amount, if Green really thought about it – she was given the best room. Not the biggest, but it was the only one positioned at the front of the house on the second level, and it was the only room that got the sun in the morning.

It was in this room that Green heard the telltale sounds of a crying girl.

Not that he was overly accustomed to the sound, of course. But he did grow up with a sister who had occasionally cried during childhood, and he did own a gym that had a lot of patrons. Granted it was pretty much half and half concerning the amount of trainers that left his gym crying, but he could always tell when it was Leaf crying.

He pushed the door open to the room quietly.

"Hey, there are like at least six people in this house that I might need to beat up for you, and let me just say, I'm not really sure I can take your mother on in a fair fight."

"Oh my god," Daisy muttered from her spot on the bed next to the teary eyed Leaf. Green noticed that Eevee was curled up in her lap, mewling gently at her.

"It's okay," Leaf sniffled as she tried to stop herself from crying more. "I don't even know what I'm really angry about."

Green joined the three girls on the bed, sitting on the other side of Leaf. He leant over and scratched his eevee behind her ears where she liked it best.

"I can try to beat up something incorporeal, but I'm not sure how successful I'd be."

Leaf let out a teary giggle and shook her head. "Don't worry, Green. I'll be okay. I just have stupid brothers."

"That narrows down the list of suspects," he said, nodding his head. "You never fight with Fire, so that leaves either Red or Ash."

"Neither of them are on their best behaviour tonight," Daisy cut in sharply.

Green winced. Chances were that it was Red who'd fucked up – as he usually did without ever intending to do so. Green had probably spent more time around him than any of his siblings had, so he was more than well versed in the art of being angry at Red.

Ash on the other hand was someone Green hadn't had much contact with. He knew Gary knew him pretty well, but in the rival-turned-sort-of-friend way. The kid was more or less a mystery to Green – so different from Red considering how similar they looked, he always threw Green off.

"They're just being boys," Leaf bemoaned and threw Green an apologetic look. "No offence."

"Don't try and make this better for them, Leaf," Daisy scolded. "Ash was insensitive and Red…" she trailed off and shot a calculated glare at Green, who raised his hands up in response.

"I live Red's problems," he said. "You can't say anything about him that I don't already know."

Daisy sighed.

"Red has issues that need to be sorted out that are beyond you, Leaf," she said, more gently.

"It's true," Green interjected. "We all love him, but his problems are many and more than just one person can deal with, Leaf. They go beyond any of us – you're allowed to be angry with him. He's not immune to that just because he's Red."

Leaf sniffled.

"Sometimes I just… feel so bad because I feel like I barely know him," she whispered. Daisy wrapped an arm around her tighter, and Eevee gave her wet cheek a lick. "I don't know what to do."

Green sighed loudly.

"To be honest, none of us do."

—

Back at the Ketchums, the house was eerily quiet. The only sounds that could be heard were the snoozes of a few pokémon, and the soft conversation of the young couple in the guest room.

"Are you okay?" Lyra asked softly as she raked her fingers through Silver's hair. "It's okay if you're not – you're allowed to be nervous."

"I'm not nervous," Silver replied stubbornly from his spot, resting his head on Lyra's lap. "I'm being… cautious."

"You can be nervous and cautious at the same time," she sung, and giggled when he opened his eyes to shoot her a glare. "Sorry, but it's true!"

"But I am," he argued. "I'm being cautious. I'm not letting myself get in too deep, I'm keeping my distance, and I'm preparing myself for when… for when it happens."

Lyra looked down at her boyfriend's pinched face sadly. She ran her fingers from his hair to the crease between his eyes and rubbed the spot gently.

"You can say his name. It's just you and me, sweetie. No judgement zone here, I promise."

Silver breathed in deeply.

"I'm just… I'm just preparing for when Giovanni arrives…"