A dusty Orange League trophy sits next to a bright and shiny Kalos crown atop of the mantelpiece. The slightly askew crown is straightened by Hannah turning it a slight bit and smiling.
She lifts her head up to see a banner being hung above her head, courtesy of Laura and Greninja trying to straighten it out. Meowstic is standing on the kitchen table, guiding both of them to either lift or drop their side of the banner. She ultimately gets frustrated with the two of them and ends up leaving them to walk outside to the backyard.
Hannah ends up laughing at her behaviour, and she receives very unimpressed looks from both Greninja and Laura. Hannah rolls her eyes and helps the two of them out. After a little longer than they'd like to admit, the banner was hanging straight, leading Hannah to smile.
Both Laura and Greninja sigh in relief and head to the backyard with Hannah following in suit. She stands at the doorframe and looks to see her Pokémon playing around, having fun under the warm, spring sun.
Weavile is chasing Meowstic around, trying to escape her grasp but is being stopped by harmless attacks from Charizard, using Flamethrower in small intervals to acts as an obstacle. Under a shaded tree, Audino is making delicate daisy chains with her newfound friend Laura.
Hannah hears footsteps and looks to the path to see a lady walking with some groceries, Gogoat in tow helping her carry them with his mouth. When Hannah spots them, she lightly jogs to meet them and grab the bag from Gogoat, patting his head before running off to see his friends again.
"Hi Delia, how was your shopping trip?" Hannah asks her as they walk back into the house.
"It went well, got everything I need to prepare the feast tonight," She says happily, "I don't get to cook for a lot of people often, so this will be fun."
Hannah smiles at that, "thank you for doing this, you didn't have to."
"Nonsense!" Delia exclaims, "I love having you here, even if it's only for a little while before you head off."
They begin to unpack the groceries and discuss various topics ranging from flower and fauna to the whereabouts of a particular boy.
"Do you know where he is?" Delia asks Hannah, putting the eggs in the fridge.
"I don't know, he didn't even wake me up when he left, just left a note on the bedside to say he needed to go somewhere this morning."
Just then the door slams open to a panting Ash. He sees both of them and gives a conspicuous smile as he all but runs to his room, hiding something in his jacket. When scurrying to his room, he says a quick hello to this mother and gives a quick kiss on Hannah's forehead as he passes before disappearing to his room.
"He's not acting strange at all," Hannah says sarcastically, causing Delia to chuckle, "when isn't he?"
After the groceries are put away, Hannah begins setting the dining table for eight people. Soon after she finishes, the doorbell rings and Hannah goes to answer it. She opens the door to see her friends, Bonnie, Clemont and Serena holding a present, "Happy Birthday Hannah!"
Hannah smiles and goes to immediately embrace them in a group hug.
"Hey guys, come on in!" Clemont hands Hannah their present and she places it on the table. Hannah sighs in relief when she sees all of her friends are happy and healthy.
"It's been too long!" Bonnie exclaims.
"We video called yesterday before your plane took off, it's been less than a day," Hannah says, ruffling Bonnie's hair which causes her to giggle.
Delia introduces herself to the three of them when Ash decides to make his grand entrance. He smiles wide at seeing his friends again and also goes to hug them.
They move to the couches where Ash sits next to Hannah, his head resting on her shoulder. The five of them talk about stories they hadn't shared with each other yet, and midway in between Bonnie recapping her traumatic experience with a Simisear, the doorbell rings yet again.
Ash answers it and in walks the last two guests, Sycamore and Korrina. Hannah jumps up to hug both of them and the conversation resumes as it was before.
"So, Hannah," Sycamore begins, placing his cup of tea on the coffee table, "how's your bedrest going?"
"It's so boring!" Hannah exclaims, "I feel like I'm doing nothing and just wasting time."
"You're not wasting time," Ash begins, "you painted that picture of the Zekrom last week."
"Exactly, I'm wasting time!" Hannah jokes, producing laughter from the others.
Soon, Delia announces it's time for dinner, and so all eight of them sit together and eat a hearty meal, still sharing stories and recalling memories from their travel.
Bonnie grows a smirk on her face which instantly worries Hannah, "Hey, Ms Ketchum-"
"You can call me Delia," she insists.
"Oh, okay," Bonnie starts, "Delia, did Ash or Hannah ever tell you about that one time?"
Hannah stops cutting her bread roll to look at Bonnie, giving her a look of 'don't you even think about it'.
"Which time, dear?" Delia questions.
"The time when Hannah and Ash were on the elevator," Bonnie says, causing both Ash and Hannah now to be staring at the young girl.
"What's this, Ash?" She asks her son, looking between the both of them.
"A-ah it's noth-" He starts.
"Well," Bonnie begins, "Ash and Hannah were in an elevator, and didn't realise the doors were opening-"
And just like that, the doorbell rings yet again, saving both Ash and Hannah.
Delia excuses herself to get the door, and soon after Hannah and Ash both look to Bonnie and tell her to not say anything. Bonnie just laughs to herself, earning a light scold from her brother.
Delia walks back into the room, "Ash, you didn't tell me we had three other visitors joining us this evening."
"We don't..." Ash trails off.
Two people and one Meowth turns the corner, looking slightly awkward and holding a poorly wrapped present.
Instead of everyone retreating back in fear as they expected, Hannah just stands up and walks to the three of them and smiles at them, "long time no see, thanks for coming out."
"You invited them here?" Sycamore asks and Hannah nods, "I wanted to, and it is my birthday after all."
Hannah turns back and James gives her their poorly wrapped present which makes Hannah smile, "thanks guys, you didn't have to."
"U-uh," Jessie stammers, "We did it for the free cake."
The other two immediately jump on that bandwagon and nod in an enthusiastic manner.
"How has your break been so far?" Hannah asks the three of them.
"It's been relaxing, but kinda boring," says Meowth, "we feel like we're doin' nothing."
Hannah nods in agreement and leads them to the table, Ash and Sycamore already getting 3 more chairs for them. They eat happily once again, now the stories being exchanged are mainly Team Rocket and Ash talking about all of their quarrels in past regions.
When dinner is over and cake is being served out, everyone begins to give Hannah her presents. Sycamore, Korrina and Delia give Hannah some money, knowing it would be useful for her travels in the future.
Hannah opens Team Rocket's present, and her smile morphs into confusion at the gift, "why are my rings in here? I thought I lost them."
"It's called regifting." Jessie says, "We took them from your hotel room during the league."
"You conveniently left that part of the story out of your recap, didn't you?" Hannah eyes them unimpressed.
"We weren't going to give them back, you should feel grateful!" James says, and Hannah just gives a slight nod and mutters 'thank you'.
Turns out Clemont and Bonnie's present was a new 'invention' curtesy of Clemont, "it's a Swiss Army knife, but better, it has more functions!"
Hannah gives a small laugh, "I remember the last time I saw one of these, someone was trying to kill me."
"Hannah, literally everything was trying to kill you last month," Bonnie answers and she receives a nod from Hannah, "you're not wrong there".
As the sun sets, all of them make their way outside to the field. Everyone lets their Pokémon out to roam around and interact with each other, and the trainers play too.
Everyone except for Hannah and Ash run out to the backyard, chasing each other happily. Hannah notices Ash starting to fidget with his hands so she says to him, "Ash, it's fine. Go have fun."
"But, you can't be with me," Ash mutters, looking dejected.
"I won't be on bedrest forever, and they're not going to be here for very long before we go off again," Hannah suggests, nudging him forward with her arm, "now go, Bonnie is desperate to play with you."
At that, Ash smiles and runs off to his friends, leaving behind a smiling Hannah.
After a while of watching her friends, Hannah feels a presence join her without looking to her side. The deck creaks under the feet of a new person sitting down beside Hannah.
They sit in a comfortable silence before Hannah interrupts it to speak to the girl, still staring ahead, "I never thanked you for that."
A small pause fills the air before the figure responds, "I don't know what you're talking about."
"For saving me."
"I didn't do anything like that."
"Don't try to deny it, Laura told me what you did."
"Well then she doesn't know what she's talking about."
Hannah turns to face her, "Well even if you admit it or not, thank you."
Immediately after saying that, a cheerful Bonnie runs up to the two girls, "Look Hannah, Serena! Audino made me a flower crown!"
"You look amazing, Bonnie," Hannah commented, Serena agreeing with a nod.
"Not as amazing as you did when you got the league crown!"
"Are you kidding me? I looked tired and sad when I was crowned!" Hannah exclaims, "I was worried I was going to fall off the stage!"
The three of them laugh and help Audino and Bonnie make more flower crowns. They do this as night approaches and they all head back inside before the guests leave the Ketchum household.
Hugging everybody goodbye, Hannah and Ash close the door on them and sigh in relief.
"What a day it's been," Ash starts, receiving a nod in agreement from Hannah.
"You coming to bed?" Hannah asks and yawns, heading to his childhood bedroom for the night.
"A-actually, before we head to bed, I u-uh," Ash stutters through his response, "I wanna give you your... birthday present."
Hannah looks at him with slight concern, "I told you not to get me anything."
"Yeah, well... I wanted to," Ash says as he goes to his room and comes back holding a box, "here you go."
Hannah smiles as Ash hands her the present, him looking nervous whilst doing so. Hannah delicately removes the wrapping paper and opens the box and gives Ash a confused look as she pulls it out of the box.
"A Pokémon egg?" Hannah asks him, which he quickly explains his response, "Y-yeah, it's a... Eevee egg."
Hannah's eyes widen as he continues to talk, "I'm not trying to get you to replace Leafeon, I just think it would be nice to keep her memory and raise a new Eevee. They don't have to be a Leafeon, maybe you'd raise a Sylveon, or an Umbreon, just a new start when we go to Alola."
Hannah looks up and her eyes get teary, she gently puts the egg down and immediately wraps Ash in a hug, whipsering into his ear, "thank you, thank you, thank you."
"No need to thank me," Ash mutters. they hug for a little longer before breaking it, Ash smiling and giving a quick peck to Hannah's lips before grabbing her hand, "come on, we need to get ready to go."
"We leave next week though," Hannah inquires, but Ash just smiles, "doesn't mean we can start now."
Hannah and Ash's eyes are both full of happiness and glee, tears streaming down Hannah's face as she hugs Ash tightly, "thank you, thank you, thank you."
"I'm so glad that Olympia told me about you all those months ago," Ash whispers, "I can't imagine my life without you."
Ash thinks to himself, 'I'm so glad that our fates did collide.'
---
hello everyone! hope you're having a good day/night!
well... its finally done. Fates Collide is finally complete after almost 3 years in the making! I never thought I'd ever finish a project this big, or that I'd be so proud of it lol.
if you were there when i first published this (28th February 2019) or you just read this book today, thank you for sticking with me and my horrid uploading schedule, for voting or for commenting on this, they really made my day on the really bad days <3
this wasn't the original ending of the book, it was a bit darker so if i ever feel up to it i may write an alternate ending to this (but don't count on it).
for those wondering, there will be no sequel to this, I only like Ash platoncially now rather than romantically so writing a sequel where they are an actual couple would not go down well for me.
thank you and I love you <3
- Hannah ✨