I never know where to start with these things.

I mean, I'm a complete stranger who's reading and reviewing your work almost six years after it's been completed. I'm not even sure you'll ever see this.

I guess a good place would be to just say thank you.

Thank you for writing this story.

Fanfiction is something that I tend to have extremely mixed feelings about; on one hand I love seeing what new adventures people can take my favorite characters on, while on the other I tend to be left saddened by a lot of stories. Whether it be because the fic was abandoned or because it feels like the fandom is ending all over again, it's rare that I find one that leaves me with a majority of good feeling. I'm the type of person that struggles to cope with the end of pretty much anything.

I'm happy to say that this story exceeded almost all of my expectations, and was in fact one of the exceptions to my "bad feeling syndrome."

I'll now go into the actual meat of my review, since I know that's what you'd want to read the most should you ever see this.

The start was phenomenal. I have read A LOT of 'Ash Disappearance' stories, which usually translates to 'Ash is betrayed by all his friends.' I'd say that of all the ones I've read, your setup is by far the best in that second category. I take issue with a lot of them because they just seem so unrealistic. They essentially paint Ash in a bad light and his friends turn their backs on him for little to no reason, and while I usually enjoy what happens afterwards, it still tends to leave a bad taste in my mouth.

This reason was extremely convincing, since you actually had substantial evidence against him. Most fics just do something lame like "someone wearing Ash's clothes with a Pikachu was seen doing a bad thing," which isn't grounds for betrayal from his friends in my opinion. Great job on the setup, I was beyond interested at the start.

Continuing off of that, I really liked that you had Ash go so far as to become a criminal in the aftermath. Again comparing this story to others, most just have him run away, become insanely powerful, and still be the good-hearted kid we know and love when he returns. While it can still be enjoyable, it's just hard to believe that something so impactful would change so little about his personality.

Paul's character was really well done, his motivation for keeping Ash's secret and the way you had him act was extremely believeable. He was a great way to force 'Alpha' to interact with the group in a natural-feeling manner.

The Team Plasma and Team Galactic cameos were a nice way to spice up the story without any consequential plot implications, and the tournament content was extremely well balanced. Sometimes the tournament in a story either feels unimportant or is super overwhelming, but the way that you included it found a good balance. It progressed the story in the background while also feeling important, allowing me to focus on the relationships between the characters (which is honestly what I came for).

Jimmy's character was really well done, a great way to add an ally and further Ash's character development (through the connection between the backstory and the present).

The way you "redeemed" Ash was good, I like that it took more than just verbal abuse to snap him out of his reverie (i.e. Paul beating him up). Nice work on that.

The Rocket conflict at the end was pretty good, though I felt the resolution was a bit too clean. In the span of a single chapter it went from everything falling apart to them beating Giovanni once and for all. On top of that, it said that the organization had been completely dismantled, even though all that they did was take down the boss. I would have liked a little more elaboration/explanation on what exactly happened, since it felt like some important details were missing.

The Red conflict was interesting and was a cool way to come full circle, bringing the mystery man from the beginning back. I had suspicions as to his importance early on, and so it was nice to see you actually do something with that plotpiece.

My one qualm with the entire story was in the events surrounding Ash, Red, and Delia. Delia's murder wasn't mentioned at all until Chapter 27 (where Ash visited her grave), and that really bugged me. If my timeline is accurate, all of that stuff went down long before Chapter 1, and yet it seemed to have no impact whatsoever on the plot. And then when the murder was finally described (at least, the first version), the detail of Hunter J's presence was completely neglected. That kind of bugged me.

Here are my final thoughts: This story is amazing. Even if I didn't love every second of it, I still had a blast binge-reading it today during this monotonous quarantine. Your humor was great (The "Alpha from the Depths of Hell," The bounty on Ash's cloak, and some of the fourth wall breaks cracked me up), and your writing style did a great job conveying your ideas. For a first fic, this is phenomenal. Every issue I had was a nitpick at best, and was just me critiquing the story.

I hope you continue your rewrite, as I'd love to see what you change and what you keep from this one.

I don't know if you'll ever read this, but again, thank you.

It's always a pleasure to see someone on this site who clearly cares about what they're writing, and I hope to see you continue doing so.

P.S. I hope you're mother is doing okay, I know in the author's notes you talked about the battle she was facing when you were writing this.

Yours,
~Tomato

DANG this was good, I'm'a go read the rewrite.

LOL that Pikachu Teleport made my night!

While this was a great story, as critic, i would likes mentions some points that you could makes better, specifically regarding to the redemption arc, in that Ash finally chose leaves his life as team rocket agent and rejoins with his former friends to could recruits them to takes down team rocket for good.

I mean, while i liked that Ash could forgives or gives another chance to his former friends, i still thinks that this part would be better if the former friends would makes something to compensates Ash than simply helps him to defeats team rocket, because i felt that this part would be better if the former friends could compensates Ash by their previous betrayal, and this means gives Ash the kind of support that they refused him when Drew framed Ash; trusts in Ash.

I mean, considering that Ash was affiliated to the team rocket, perhaps after defeated the team rocket, Ash would be still arrested for his crimes, especially for admitted that he commited a homicide in front of the authorities, adding that possibly after takes control from the base, perhaps the authorities retrieves documents and dossiers that have information about the "feats" of Ash as agent, among of this, his list of pokemon stolen, his targets and even his kills, making that with this information, the authorities had evidence enough to considers Ash a too dangerous person or even terrorist, making that even if he gave his cooperation to brings down team rocket, the authority would considers that Ash should be sentenced after see this evidence, and perhaps he gets as punishment 30 years of jail, adding that possibly gets his liscence of pokemon trainer revoked permanently. And even they mentions that this sentence wasn't worse thanks to his cooperation, because if Ash was arrested and he don't gives any cooperation, his normal and fair sentence should be life sentence or even death penalty, to shows him how much serious is his criminal record.

But then when Ash, with a look of defeat, accepts the end of his career and dreams as master pokemon, his former friends and Cynthia comes to the rescue. Perhaps even if they were shocked and disgusted for the crimes commited for Ash, they would considers that all this was their fault, because if they would trusted in Ash in the past, their friend would nevers do this, making that the fact that the current situation of Ash, is by their previous wrong actions. Then the former friends would talks in his defense and each one would tells to the tribunal about their adventures with Ash, about how he helped anyone, saved several pokemon, fighted against criminal organiztions and even saved the world in several circunstances. Then this would makes that the tribunal debates about this and they asks the former friends of Ash about their proposition regarding the fate of Ash, then the former friends proposes that Ash can pays his sentence of 30 years with something similar like house arrest, and parole, and all they can be his legal guardians to watches for him and makes sure that he fulfills his sentence, adding that maybe they could begs that the Ash's liscence wouldn't be revoked permanently.

Then after much thinking, the tribunal reluctancy agrees with changes the jail time of Ash for something similar to house arrest with parole, and be watched for his friends, adding that maybe they would simply suspends his liscence for a period of 5 years, making that Ash can have officlal pokemon battles after this time. But then the tribunal would gives them two declarations about this decision. First, even if his liscence would be reinstated eventually, Ash would be still banned for compites for the title of regional Champion in any region, even he would be forbidded of became an elite four or even a gym leader, for his criminal record, making that he only can participates in the pokemon league tournaments, but he don't have any legal right to participates in the champion league. And second, the tribunal would warns that considering that the former friends of Ash would be his guardians during his special parole, if Ash commits any serious crime during his sentence, his former friends would also pays for this and would shares the original sentence together with Ash, including the permanent nullifying of their liscences.

But to the surprise of Ash, his friends don't even doubts to accepts this conditions, after all, they let down Ash in the past, then now they can makes ammends for their betrayal to gives Ash a confidence vote to accepts the risks of this parole, even after learned that Ash could be capable to steal or kills, making that Ash starts to see them like his friends again, to see how they don't even doubt in sides with him, in spite to the dangers of that with this, they put in jeopardize their careers and lives, making that this works perfectly as a worthy redemption to the former traitors and that they can be in peace with Ash again and for good.

And regarding to Cynthia, perhaps after that Ash dealed with Red, would be revealed that the sinnoh champion felt very culprit for ruined the chance of Ash to could became a champion and possibly a master pokemon in the future, and then she used her contacts, her influence, and even pulls some levers, and she managed to convinced and persuaded the pokemon league and the government to could lifts the ban of Ash, to mentioned how much promising is Ash as trainer, adding that even if he killed several people in the past, he also saved several people in many cases to stops the rampage of the legendary pokemon in many occasions, allowing to Ash could fulfills his dreams again, though that maybe the pokemon league forced to Cynthia that her match with Ash would be reseted, and this would means that if she wants that Ash can challenges her again, he should redo the pokemon league and the champion league of sinnoh, but as if ash bothers this, as now thanks to cynthia, he can aspires to be a pokemon master again. And after learns this, he would see in the media about the title that he got for his past ordeal, the betrayed champion.

This is only an opinion about how this story could had a better finale. But i still respect your good job, was a honor read this story.

Samuel actually would make the cut as a Trainer, he has a Dragonite and had a Charmeleon 40 years before/while the Iron-Masked Marauder caught Celebi,

oof

u h o h

"My brother."
chills

Oh.
Damn, Alpha, you just forced your old... "friend" to kill a man.

Makes sense that you wouldn't call him Red.

After all, there's already someone named Red, but it's in NATO.

And then he gets them back right away next chapter... lol I spoke too soon

And all this time im just wondering why ash doesnt get all his old pokemon back. By stealing them or whatever. They would be strong I imagine

AHAHAHAAHHHAHAHAHAHHHAHHHHHHH

You say Red and Satoshi are too overused, but Alpha isn't? I mean, it's kinda original for a pokemon fanfic, but the name Alpha appears in a lot of betrayed fics for a lot of other fandoms. I'm not hating, I love your story, but I just though I'd point that out.

And so it begins...