Pokemon One-Shots and Headcanons

Why I Made Serena Betray Ash: An Explanation

One of my more popular books on my fanfiction account is my story A Broken Bond. To sum it up, it's an Ash betrayal story, but with a slightly different plot than the usual. This time...well, I won't provide any other spoilers for the plot; you'll just have to read it yourself. Yes, I'm being a prick and fishing for reads. What are you going to do about it? 

Anyway, when I wrote the story, I decided to make Serena a traitor. This was probably surprising to a lot of people, since I've always been a very outspoken Amourshipper. I wouldn't say I've been toxic, since I don't necessarily despise all other shippers (well, Pokeshippers are an exception), but I have made my love for Amour clear. 

Now, I'm sure I know what you're all wondering. If I like Amour so much, why did I make Serena a traitor? And that, everyone, is exactly what I'll be diving into today. 

First of all, I guess I will have to spoil a small bit of the plot in order to make this explanation make sense. The entire betrayal was actually orchestrated by Professor Oak in an attempt to get Ash to hand over Greninja so he could run some experiments on him. Some of Ash's friends willingly sided with him, others had to be manipulated. In this story, Serena was one of the manipulated ones. 

But how did he do it? 

Simple. By using her crush on Ash against her. 

Now to explain this part, let's look at what we know about Serena. We know that she and Ash met at summer camp, and she developed a crush on him there that persisted for several years. We also know that she has a tendency to get...ah...slightly jealous when she thinks she has competition with other girls. I mean, just look at her interactions with Miette and even how she reacted when Penelope (the kindergarten teacher who beat Ash's Froakie with Sylveon) told Ash that if she beat him in a battle, he would have to "come with her for a little while". 

As for Professor Oak, we know that he's spent his entire life researching Pokemon. This is important, because as a researcher, it's natural that you'd develop a fairly keen sense of observation. We also know that Professor Oak ran the summer camp Ash and Serena attended, and probably witnessed their interactions many times over. 

Now let's flash forward to just before the first chapter of the story, where Serena has just met Misty, May, Dawn, and Iris. Given that May, Dawn, and Iris are very pretty girls and Serena hasn't met them before, it's natural that she'd feel shocked and somewhat threatened by these new girls. At this point, she doesn't know if Ash returns her feelings or not, since he hasn't had a chance to tell her himself, and meeting four other girls who have also known him for a long time, three of which are extremely good-looking, would be a devastating blow to her confidence. 

So now not only does she have Miette to worry about, but all of Ash's other female companions as well. And Professor Oak, being as observant as he is, jumps at the opportunity to drag her into his plans. He tells her that if she goes along with his plan, she'll be sure to get together with Ash. Since she feels threatened and afraid, Serena blindly agrees to go along with his schemes. 

Anyway, that's my explanation as to why Serena was made a traitor. No, she would probably never do something like that for real. But as I mentioned before, she's desperate, scared, and hurt as well since Ash never told her about the other girls he traveled with, and that combination can drive people to do things they would never even dream of doing otherwise. 

Though if it makes it any better, she did get redeemed in the sequel. Am I off the hook now?