fates collide // an ash xy love story

xxviii // shadow

They all get ready and Hannah summons all five of them to their Pokéballs, save Weavile who sits right in her normal spot on her shoulder.

Hannah holds her necklace in her hand and she smiles, moving towards the door for her exit from the hotel, for one of the last times.

Hannah hopes to avoid anyone she knows before the battle, never a big fan of chatting before something big. So, she walks strategically, not moving anywhere she knows people may be going. She purposely takes the long way around buildings, back exits to avoid people.

Since she took the long way, that means she's cutting it close with her arrival time.

She begins to walk down the unnecessarily long hallway, her footsteps the only thing that echoes through it.

Hannah walks down the hallway to the waiting room, minutes away from her final battle in the Kalos region. She nervously walks slower than usual, not wanting to battle at all. Her nervous glances have her looking everywhere but the end of the hallway, somehow trying to escape what's inevitable.

Her gaze did catch onto something familiar. She faults in her tracks to turn to look at the wall where she sees the Johto region photo that she saw with Ash.

She smiles slightly, looking down at the description of the piece once more,

"A few moments peace between the ongoing feud amongst two species of the same evolution line."

'A feud Ash permanently ended,' Hannah smiles fondly, looking up at the photo again, 'Once this is done, I'm taking him with me somewhere new... if he wants to of course-'

Hannah hears the call for her name and stops her train of thought to head to the waiting room, but not before muttering to herself, "Even if I'm dragging him, we're going there together."

She walks until she hits the door to enter the battlefield, in the waiting room no one is with her. She looks out of the window to view the other waiting room, it holding her opponent.

She looks away from it, trying not to think about the battle but it's all in vain when the door is opened by security to let her onto the field when her name is called.

She takes a deep breath before walking out, standing next to the security guard and out of sight to the public. she can't help but look toward Ash's side of the arena, and sees him and Pikachu looking at her, he waves, but Hannah doesn't reciprocate, the weight of the situation finally hitting her as she needs to battle him to win.

She looks away quite awkwardly, leading Weavile to flick her on the back of her head out of annoyance, her knowing her trainer a little too well.

Ash looks on at the two with confusion, looking to his companion for an explanation to what happened but only receiving a shrug in confusion, him also not knowing what on earth she is doing.

'Might be nerves,' Ash wonders, but then remembers she doesn't have nerves, she doesn't get scared, and she certainly doesn't feel anxious to battle him.

Right?

His train of thought is interrupted by the crowd screaming louder than normal. He looks to the big screen to see the screen has turned on to display both himself and Hannah, six Pokéballs on the screen per trainer and their photo on either side of the screen. The stock standard layout for a tournament.

Sir Michael makes his appearance on the screen once again as he begins one of his last speeches of this years tournament, "A very warm welcome to everyone tuning in to the final battle."