#goh

Warnings: Mild angst, aged-up characters.

Staring up at what it is more familiar for him to call the Cerise Laboratory still, brings it all back. He is ten again. He'd woken up late that day as he'd done on all his best days. He is racing to Professor Oak's Laboratory, being told that a new lab will be opening that day in Vermilion and would he like to come along? There had only been one answer he would ever have given. He'd gone in Professor Oak's car then along with his Mom and Mimey, undeterred by his mother's plans to use the opportunity to go shopping and with mounting excitement as he'd stared out of the window and spotted Pokémon after Pokémon. He hadn't known it at the time, but there was the sense of a new adventure in the air. In Vermilion and by that point full of energy, he'd raced up the steps to the lab, spotted Yamper and received an electric shock as thanks for thinking it cute and for trying to pet it. Inside he'd listened as Professor Cerise had held court and as he'd deduced that a rare Pokémon would be arriving at Vermilion Harbour in twenty minutes. After that he just remembers being on Lugia. Seeing him for the first time...

Ten years. It has been ten years, well more than that due to the fact that it is ten years now since Goh and he had parted. Ash wonders whether either one of them will mention it that day?

He is still aching with nostalgia as he stares up at the lab, stuck in that spot on the warm afternoon as if frozen by a Pokémon move when a figure appears at the top of the steps.

"Ash! I thought I heard someone," Goh says with a soft, wry smile upon his face and although he may be older Ash can still look past the glasses, laboratory coat and tied up long hair and see the boy he'd once known.

"Goh!" Ash turns on a beaming smile, trots up the steps and firmly pulls the other man against him. "Or should I say Professor Goh now?"

"Idiot. You haven't changed," Goh snickers in a fond tone close to his ear. "These are new though." He holds Ash's hand up and frowns down at it.

"Sunspots! Mom said that I have at least one for every journey." He draws back and runs a sheepish hand through his hair, brown eyes glistening in the sun.

Goh can't help but smile in spite of himself, stopping himself from telling Ash that he should have worn suncream-he'd been just as bad after all, he still is for that matter-and tugging him by the hand loosely inside the lab, which holds so much memories for the pair of them.

"Are Chrysa and Ren still here?" Ash asks as he looks around keenly.

"Uh-huh, they agreed to stay," Goh sounds triumphant now but Ash isn't surprised-who would say no to him? He frowns when he remembers that Goh might still see it as if Ash had rejected him all those years prior. He's about to say something, about to explain that, that is not how it was at all, that he'd known they were at different stages of their journeys that's all, when Goh looks over his shoulder at him and asks, "That reminds me-where's Pikachu?"

"He wanted to catch up with the others at Cerise Park. Lucario too," Ash gets out, before he winces a little.

Goh takes a moment to think how nice that will be for Cinderace and all his other Pokémon, before he reassures Ash, "It's still called that," with a quick squeeze of his hand. Ash marvels, not for the first time that Goh can seemingly read and understand his every expression. That must be one of the reasons why he has been able to become a professor at such a young age and he feels that familiar sense of pride again-the one that has been erupting inside him ever since he'd first heard the news. "I wanted the name to stay," Goh adds softly, before he looks away again, but not before Ash has caught the sudden wistful expression that has dropped over his face. Ash realises it then-Goh remembers that it has been ten years too.

In the aftermath of this great discovery he is about to say something, he doesn't know what, when Goh pulls him into the main research room-the room where Goh and he had been assigned so many of their research missions. They'd been so busy exploring the different regions that neither of them had seemed to realise that it would not last forever until the moment had been right on top of them. But then Ash is smiling again because here are Chrysa and Ren. There is an increased amount of Psyduck merchandise on Chrysa's desk-a Pokémon that reminds an increasingly nostalgic Ash of another old friend and there is Francois-

"You're a Magneton now!" Ash exclaims excitedly and the others laugh, whilst Francois buzzes and flips around.

"Yep, you've missed a lot," Goh tells him and Ash is sure for a moment that he detects some hurt in his voice. Yet when he looks at Goh, Goh isn't staring at him to receive it and he looks so cheerful that Ash wonders if he'd just imagined Goh's pain because he himself has been thinking so much about the past that day. He glances at Goh again and when Goh smiles at him in a genuine fashion Ash decides to let it go.

Goh takes him into the room they used to share next.

"It seems so small." Ash stares at the bunk beds, recalling how Goh and he had been woken up one night by Riolu hatching and trying to remember every detail, but all he can think about is the distance between that time and then. It makes him feel sad.

"Right?" Goh agrees, missing or at the very least not acknowledging Ash's mood for once. "Would we even fit into those beds now?"

"I bet we would," Ash is filled with a sudden recklessness and charges forward, clambering into the bottom bunk and trying not to remember how Goh had won the top all those years ago.

"Ash!" Goh protests, though he comes forwards too, rolling his eyes a little when Ash, who has successfully managed to contort himself into that space, props himself up on one elbow and grins up at him.

"Try it Goh please, for old times sake?" Ash gives him his best puppy eyes and Goh, with some mumbling, rids himself of his lab coat, before he climbs up to the top bunk. It feels a bit more of a squeeze than it had done, him having had quite the growth spurt since then, but he still fits. Below him he can hear Ash shifting onto his back and sighing with contentment.

"What's with you?" he asks Ash a little uncertainly. "Does coming back here make you sad or something?" He can't bring himself to ask,'Does seeing me make you sad?' Ash doesn't answer and when Goh hears him snoring a moment later he mutters, "Typical."

----

A little while later in Cerise Park, after they have reunited with their Pokémon and joined Professor Cerise, his wife Talia and their children Parker and Chloe, along with Chrysa and Ren and a few others for the official handover from Professor Cerise to Goh, people are milling around the area with drinks and interacting with all the Pokémon and each other. Chloe, who has agreed to continue to be a Research Fellow when she is not too busy trying to catch all the Eeveelutions, something that she is trying to do to keep her own Eevee happy as it has decided it does not want to evolve but would still like to imitate the others from time to time, joins Goh, holding a drink of her own.

Goh is watching Ash move easily through the crowd. He grabs a bite of food there, a drink here, he chats to so-and-so, admires this Pokémon, that Pokémon. He comes across as utterly charming and Goh wonders if he had just imagined the troubled, sad aura that he had thought he'd sensed around him.

"It must be nice for you to catch up with Ash," Chloe breaks into Goh's thought.

Goh ponders that statement for a moment. "You remember when I was worrying about seeing him again and whether it would be awkward?" Chloe gives him a, 'Duh,'look, which Goh supposes is valid considering he only felt like that yesterday, before her face turns puzzled.

"Did something happen?"

"Not that I know." Goh stares at Ash consideringly again. "I just feel like something's going on with him."

"Did you try and talk to him about it?"

"Yeah, but...he fell asleep!" Goh pulls a face.

"Well," Chloe just about manages to stop herself from rolling her eyes. "Try again then." Goh looks from her to Ash doubtfully and then back at Chloe again. "Goh"- she pushes him towards Ash with one arm-"I swear, it will be worth it. Just try again."

"All right," Goh responds a little uncertainly, before he swallows and marches more confidently towards Ash. After all Goh might not have got exactly what he hoped for from their reunion, which was that after he's rooted and supported Ash from afar-something that he is certain that Ash has done for him too judging by how quickly he'd learnt that Goh was a professor-they would just slip back easily into the kind of relationship that they had, had before and just be Ash and Goh again, but this is still Ash and he is still Goh. Surely if anyone can figure out what is going on with his friend then Goh can?

"Oh hey Goh!" Ash looks around from watching some of his Pokémon playing with Goh's as Goh steps beside him. "It's so nice to see everyone back together again, isn't it?"

"Are we going to talk about it?" Goh asks him in a low tone, ignoring Ash's breezy statement. Ash looks at him in bafflement. "You've been kind of weird today?" Goh risks hurting Ash's feelings.

A cloud scuds over Ash's face and he looks the other way, not sure what to say, not to say...

"Hey..." Goh says, softly encouraging him into action through knocking his own hand gently against his. "The future's in the palm of our hands, right?" A grin flutters across Ash's face at the familiar phrase, before it dies instantly.

"It's just," the brown eyed boy looks at him a little desperately now, the playful cries of their oblivious Pokémon filling up the background, "You're not still cross about how we left things, are you?"

Goh looks surprised for a moment, before he shakes his head. "Of course not. Yes, I was upset and all this time I keep thinking of things I want to tell you and finding it really annoying when you're not there"-

"Me too!" Ash enthuses.

"But I know that we both needed to go and do different things. Besides, I would never have made professor if I hadn't continued to grow." Ash looks relieved by this.

"I know we've done a lot without each other, but I've been thinking for a while now-being here, what we did all those years ago, that was the best time for me. Travelling the world, coming back here, it was like having a"-

"Home?" Goh interjects with a quiet meaningfulness because it is like that for him too. That was one of the reasons why, despite his nerves, he'd been determined to accept the offer of taking over the lab.

Ash nods, looking grateful that Goh understands, but then Goh always understands. "Yeah," he says.

"So?" Goh says with an air of cheekiness about him, "What are you going to do about it?" Ash looks stunned. "You've got a problem so how are you going to fix it? You could always be a Research Fellow again?"

"And have you as my boss?" Ash's face relaxes. "Not sure that I want that." To Goh's delight Ash picks him up and half-twirls him around.

"Ash!" Goh hits his shoulders and wriggles about a bit but Ash just laughs because he can tell that Goh doesn't really mind. A few of the Pokémon and humans stop what they are doing to stare at them, but Ash and Goh don't even notice-it might as well just be them. Them as Ash lowers Goh a little and their faces come into close proximity. Them as Ash realises, staring into Goh's eyes, which are the same colour of the sea on the day they'd first met, the full extent of what he feels. Them as Goh's breath wavers in anticipation across Ash's face as he becomes aware of the latter's strange expression.

"What are you up to Ketchum?" Goh asks him suspiciously and Ash reddens, his grip tightening instinctively on Goh as his body does the only thing that makes sense in that moment-he kisses his best friend.

Chloe whoops and cheers, saying something like it's about time. Professor Cerise cautions her. Parker grins and then turns his head away in embarrassment. Talia smiles. Chrysa and Ren exchange happy, carefree glances. And Goh? He just kisses Ash back enthusiastically as their hearts flutter wildly in their chests between them. Home, each heartbeat seems to say, home.