Disclaimer - I don't claim the rights to anything! Just rigging my OTPs to behave the way I want them to!

Author - Warlordess

Notes - Originally I was going to skip this theme, or else use one of the alternates, because I don't like axing characters for a ship. I know he ain't dead, but the point of this is to remove him from his place in canon and it's still not fair. Tracey already gets enough hate in the fandom (and to this day, I still don't know why).

However, luckily, I found a loophole in the theme phrasing that I decided to exploit the crap out of so, instead, I stuck with what we were given for day two after all!

I hope everyone enjoys and, pretty please, like and reblog! It makes me feel really good about my stupid writing when others care enough to share!

OoOoO

She's hiding it well, and thank goodness, but of course it comes a little easier when her personal mortification is stifled by her overwhelmingly intense fear and aggravation about being stranded alone on a deserted island with one, Ash Ketchum, as the only other human around.

This could be the end for them, she thinks.

"I think we've accidentally captured a pair of very romantic creatures in our little cage!" James mocked enthusiastically.

"You mean?! D'aawe…" Jessie replied.

"Der loiveboids!" Meowth ridiculed in his odd accent.

And none too soon.

But then, the island ends up completely populated after all (if somewhat isolatedly so), and the both of them are assuredly, absolutely, irrevocably relieved to know it, relieved that they no longer have only each other to contend with, relieved that they don't have to absorb themselves in their own mortification about Team Rocket's remarks hours earlier, and relieved that they can distract themselves with a decent meal.

"This is the best thing I've ever eaten!" Ash exclaims, devouring his apparently gourmet entree in seconds.

"Ash, it's a greasy cheeseburger at a theme park family restaurant," Misty reminds him, nibbling on one of her onion rings and sipping some water to chase it down, watching as the boy before her unceremoniously gulps down half his soda and then picks his sleeve of fries up and begins to inhale them with similar fervor.

And Team Rocket thinks she's into that? Not likely, she concludes with a roll of her eyes, even as her cheeks flush vibrantly in defiance. And yet she can't help wondering about it, can't help mulling it over. Well, it's not like her friend - friend? Is he really? - is in any mood to hold a conversation, right? So what else can she do but think?

How can anyone believe she would be interested in Ash Ketchum? Between his frustratingly self-sacrificial behavior, his egoistic fixation on winning gym matches and battles, his one-track-mind, his stupid hat, his intent to use a Pokemon he's already shown he's incapable of controlling, his inability to understand her as a girl (and it's not that she wants him knowing too much, she's gotta have some boundaries, some secrets - not that those secrets have to do with any feelings either, just so she's clear)…

Realizing she's rambling to herself, she clears her throat (and hopefully her head), inadvertently drawing Ash's attention.

"What's up?" he asks blankly, apparently without a care in the world.

He should be so lucky.

"Nothing!" she immediately responds, tone slightly higher pitched than it should be.

"Ooookaaay…" he drawls back with a raised eyebrow, unsure if the matter is worth pursuing. But it's enough of an interruption for him to give up on eating the rest of his food (not that there's much left to lose interest in).

"It's just, I was thinking about how funny it was for Team Rocket to say we were running away together, you know? I mean, us two? And just because Brock left us alone for all of a few hours. Well, a few hours at that point anyway."

"I know, right? As if I'd ever be interested in a scrawny, whiney brat like you! I'm going to be the world's number one Pokemon Master! Why should I settle for you when I'll probably have loads of girls who wanna be with me? Not that I'm interested in that kind of stuff," he adds at the end, but of course the damage is done.

"Excuse me? If anyone can do better, it's me! I actually know what it means to treat someone right, how to show them I care! All you care about is Pokemon training! Being with you would be a waste of anyone's time, Ash Ketchum!" she huffs, drawing her arms up to her chest and crossing them. "Especially mine!"

"Oh, I'm a waste of your time just because I have a goal I'm gonna make come true?!"

"No, you're a waste of my time because that's all you've got going for you! Why would I wanna be with a guy whose only potential conversation topic and date idea is the ten or twenty trainers you managed to beat that day?!" she ridicules, glad that they're sitting at a booth because it's a lot less convenient to get up and draw more attention to themselves.

Not that they need any help there.

"Well, who'd wanna be with a girl who spends all of her time yelling a - and insulting them - wait…" he pauses momentarily, retracts his comment with a soft shake of his head, and instead asks, "You think I'm capable of beating a good twenty trainers a day?"

"Uuuh…" the redhead tapers off, unbridled panic accumulating in her chest. No, no! They'd finally broken through whatever wall Team Rocket had erected between them due to their unwarranted commentary about their relationship! Why was Ash latching on to the slightest positive slip-up in the middle of their latest argument? Didn't he know that was just going to make things weird between them again?

"Th - that's not what I meant!" she does her best to convince him, convince herself, even though she can at least admit inside her own head that she absolutely has that much faith in him. The trick is keeping him from believing that for certain.

"But it's what you said, Misty."

The other diner guests have returned to their own meals at this point, management wary but content that two of their youngest patrons are calming down and (hopefully) don't need to be tossed from the establishment and banned.

"L - look, just because that's what you heard doesn't mean that's what I–"

"–Yeah, I guess that's true. I mean, as if you'd think so much of me, right?" But he doesn't sound wounded. He just sounds… accepting.

Accepting of what?

"You know what? I just thought of something," he says next by way of changing the subject.

Misty's fears begin alleviating themselves, evaporating to nothing, but not entirely quite yet. She's spent the last six or seven hours staving off a panic attack at the possibility of the dynamic between she and Ash shifting, careening full-speed down a road neither of them are equipped to handle quite yet. Unbeknownst to her, of course, Ash has been doing much the same thing. And here they are now, still unsure what the aftermath is going to be for them.

"What is it, Ash?" she asks anyway, hoping he'll say something to permanently clear the air.

"We're fighting because Team Rocket said some stupid stuff to us but… I mean, it's Team Rocket, right? Chances are that they were just trying to get under our skin to distract us and make getting away with our Pokemon easier."

So simple. So eloquent. Who cares if it's true or not? So much so that Misty can't believe she hadn't thought of it herself before now. Never mind that the chances of Team Rocket being that cunning were on the slim side. This is a way out, an escape from their emotional predicament, if ever she'd heard of it.

And suddenly she can ignore the little voice in the back of her head demanding she face those feelings that she definitely doesn't have. And he can tune out those few memories he's stored, saved, of a familiar redheaded girl in a kimono, once with a medium-length wig and crown (leaving her immediately unrecognizable), even a few times never changing her clothes at all and just wearing the charming kind of smile he's never expected her to be capable of. And they can pretend for awhile longer that their relationship is exactly as they wear it on their sleeves.

So they spend the next twenty or thirty minutes getting along just fine; all shallow discussion with a minor side in ridiculing their everyday pseudo-villainous stalkers. And things are indeed normal for a time, no more Exeggutor shells, no sweating it out in fear of change not in their control. It's just… them being them, and it's nice.

It happens as they're leaving the diner, trashing their burger wrappers and fry and onion ring sleeves and grabbing a last refill of their chosen beverages in their styrofoam cups before heading to the PokeCenter to check on their Pokemon.

There's a young man in a long teal green tee-shirt at a nearby table, currently engrossed in his own meal. But across from him is an open sketchpad, and on the page displayed…

"Wha - wha - what is that?" Misty yelps, so shocked that she actually has to point a shaking index finger at it.

"Huh? What's what?" Ash asks from behind her, his chin nearly bumping into her shoulder as he stands on his tippy-toes hoping for a better look. And when he indeed gets it…

"Mwah! What is that?!"

It's them, a sketch of course, from sometime in the past hour or so. They're sitting across from each other at their booth, smiling, mouths open as if they're chatting. The ambience is lighthearted and friendly, maybe more than friendly, if the level of comfortability in the image before them holds any truth at all.

"Oh, sorry," the teenage boy - presumably the artist of the outrageously invasive but otherwise highly skilled piece of work - responds almost bashfully to their commentary. "I hope it's not out of line. I usually draw Pokemon but there aren't too many options for that while I'm here. I just got bored while I was waiting for my food so…"

"B - but - but why do we - why would you - why do we look - I don't–" Ash articulates oh-so-well until Misty decides to take over for him.

"I can't believe you'd just peep on two random strangers like this! It's so gross and rude a - and inappropriate! Not to mention we don't look a thing like that! We barely like each other at all!"

"W - wait a sec!" the teenage boy says, apparently taking some offense to this latest criticism, "I'm a Pokemon Watcher - I draw based on what I see, and this is what I saw between the two of you a little while ago. You both may not notice, you may not like it, and maybe it's not one hundred percent constant - but at the time, this is exactly how you looked."

The two preteens stare dumbfoundedly at the young man, then down at the fruits of his labor, then back again in disbelief.

It was one thing when it was just Team Rocket. They could more easily than not blow off anything the dastardly trio said, even if it took some time to come to grips. But this is different. Now it's a stranger somehow drawing the conclusion that they're on such good terms (for lack of a more comfortable phrasing). Now it runs the risk of being true as opposed to just being a ploy used in order to steal their Pokemon while they're distracted like they'd been so content in pretending.

"A Pokemon Watcher, huh?" Misty asks begrudgingly as she takes in the fine-line details of his work.

"Yeah, my name's Tracey. How about you guys? I have to admit, it would add a nice personal flair if I could include your names."

"Include our… on that?" the redhead replies warily with a nod across the table at his sketchbook.

Of course, she doesn't think it's a good idea. She and Ash have both just barely escaped an epic degree of change that neither of them were ready for. Both of them have just conceded neutrality and resumed safe ground and returned to normal and this? This is the kind of thing that leads to questioning their comfort zone all too sudden, all too soon. This is the kind of thing that leads to hearts potentially reacting and stomachs potentially flopping and minds potentially racing.

But, before she can say this, before Misty can say she wants no part in it and the guy - Tracey, her head automatically fills in for her - will just have to call the darn picture 'Ode to Two Random Kids Who Usually Don't Get Along Actually Doing So For Once' or something like that, her friend - friend? Seriously?! - manages to chime in.

"My name's Ash."

"Ash, why are you–?!" Misty yelps in reply. She wonders if the guy's 'good samaritan' streak is so intensely constant that he ended up automatically introducing himself because he didn't sense a threat or something.

"What's the big deal? It's just a drawing," he shrugs back at her in response.

And, for a split second she wonders if that's really all he sees. This is Ash, after all. Something artsy and intimate like this could easily go over his head, she thinks. She wouldn't expect anything less of him.

But then she notices a faint twitch in his step. She sees the odd glimmer in his eyes, the palest of reds dusting his cheeks. And she knows that he's probably taking this que from her, that he probably wasn't intuitive enough to figure it out on his own but that her unnecessary anger and understandable panic alerted him to the underneath of the underneath of their situation… And yet, he's taking this plunge anyway, huh?

And she discovers maybe it's not so impossible to be forthcoming with change. Maybe, if Ash can come this far, make this move, then she can do something more as well.

"My name's Misty," she softly adds, the final introduction to their group, shaking hands and watching as the boy adds their names to the bottom of the sketch page, followed by the name of the restaurant and a timestamp.

So maybe it wasn't just Team Rocket who saw something after all. And maybe she does have feelings for her - friend? Yes, at the very least - friend, Ash Ketchum.

And maybe that was okay to embrace, even if she could never say it out loud.

OoOoO

Notes - See what I did there? Eh? Tracey doesn't actually join Ash and Misty on their travels but still happens to cross paths and effect their future behavior and relationship. I know, I know, I'm a genius… Lol.

Btw, I was thinking that Ash and Misty would have found Lapras after they left the diner and were heading to the PokeCenter so, yeah, that's still a thing that happens.

Anyway, that's all I've got.