This was based off a prompt on the Pokeprompts community on Dreamwidth. Thanks for reading!
Roadmaps prompt:
People give up on love sometimes
That's why God made the earth round,
So that if two people who are meant to be
Decide to walk different paths,
Still at one part of the world,
The ends of their roads will meet
-Anonymous
"Relationships take work!" Candice stomped on the ground.
"Yeah, work!" Flint pumped up a fist.
"You got to put more effort in if you want them to last, you know?" She stuck her index finger out and waggled it at him.
"You know?" Flint pumped up his fist again and repeated after her.
Mocking him? Mocking her? Mocking them both. Volkner scoffed. Typical.
"I know!" Candice spun to face Flint.
"She knows!" He spun to face her.
Volkner glared at both of them. "Why don't you guys just follow me around or something and keep shouting advice at me? Sure got a lot of free time for a gym leader and Elite Four member."
"Well, Mopey, if you weren't such a cranky mess all the time, we wouldn't have to do that, hmm? Stop ignoring us and come out of your metal cage. Enjoy the sun! Splash in the waves! Explore the world! There's more to life than just battling and renovating that damn gym of yours. You live in, like, the best city of all Sinnoh and you sure do take it for granted." Candice huffed and crossed her arms.
"Battle at two. Tutoring my trainers at three. The energy officials coming in to discuss fixing the power grid at four. What do you expect, to clear my schedule just because you two want to go skipping stones?"
Candice heaved a sigh of defeat. "Fine. If you don't care about me, so be it. But look at how sad Flint is, your bestest friend, the guy you grew up with is absolutely shattered by the fact you can't even make time for him anymore."
Volkner looked at Flint.
He was massaging his head through his thick, red curls.
"Flint," Candice hissed as she nudged him. He glanced at her quizzically.
"What–oh yes." He straightened and twisted his mouth into an exaggerated frown and took a deep breath.
"HOW COULD YOU! I thought we were–" he stopped to swing his head back and put a hand to his forehead in a theatrical fashion "–BEST BUDDIES. But no! You don't want to be with me anymore. Hold me, Candice, while I weep for this tragedy." He swung himself into Candice's arms and wailed sharply, causing a passerby to spill his coffee–in fright or in surprise Volkner did not know. Candice patted his back and glared at Volkner.
Volkner stifled a chuckle. "Nice performance, Flint."
His friend looked back at him, grinning. "Thanks. I've finally got my re-enactment of Candice reacting to the heel of her favourite shoe snapping off–
"Hey!" Candice shouted and shoved him away from her, stalking off in a huff. Volkner could see she was rolling her eyes and smirking and he couldn't help but do the same.
"Whoops, got to go." Flint hopped backwards to catch up. "Seriously though, see the sun sometime, okay?"
"Maybe." Volkner waved as his friend ran off.
The sun was up high in the sky, shining down on the glittering sea just on the edge of the city beside the lighthouse. Small children were bumbling around with their pokemon and vendors were hawking their goods.
It was a nice day. As always.
He went back inside.
"I'm back!"
Jasmine turned towards the voice and was about to open her mouth to speak when she felt someone quite literally crashing into her and smothering her in her arms.
"Urghh!" Jasmine could barely breathe.
"Oh my gosh, I missed you so much Jasmine! Wow, you haven't changed a bit." Whitney finally let go of her and proceeded to look her up and down.
"It's only been a month," Jasmine said.
"Yes, but a lot can happen in a month. I got a tan. And look, I took pictures. There's me at the space centre, and there's me at that cool city created by some meteor, and there's me at a museum and, oh nevermind that, I brought souvenirs!" She flung her polaroids down onto the ground and started digging through her scuffed up backpack.
"For you!" Whitney dropped a bag of white stuff unceremoniously into Jasmine's hands.
Jasmine stared at it and tried her best to be polite though she had an urge to hold the bag with two fingers as far from her as she could. "Wha-what's this?"
"Salt from some cave. It's very famous so I collected it while there. Super salty I heard, so don't use too much of it at once while cooking!"
"Oh. Well, thank you–"
The other girl laughed. "Jasmine, what sort of friend do you think I am? You really think my gift for you is a bag of salt?"
"You just said–"
"This is for you!" Whitney dumped a device shaped like a candy tube into her hands. "A pokeblock case! It has a portable blender too. Contests are really popular over there, and everyone makes pokeblocks for them. Now you can too!"
Jasmine looked at the pokeblock case and she felt her heart race at the thought of its potential.
"Oh. My. Thank you Whitney!"
"No problem, no problem. You know, you should have come with me. You could've totally put it to good use in Hoenn."
Jasmine felt her smile falter. It would've been amazing to be in the midst all that beauty and excitement. "I'd have loved to come with you. But you know how busy–"
"Busy, busy, busy as always. Jasmine, I'm a gym leader too but I can still make time for fun–"
"You forgot to finish your end-of-the-month report last time."
"I didn't forget, I overslept, okay? Anyway, that's beside the point. All you spend your time on is your job–"
"There's nothing wrong with liking my job and my pokemon."
"–you really have no other things on your bucket list?" Whitney raised an eyebrow and eyed the pokeblock case.
Jasmine didn't say anything because Whitney did not need to know anything about her dreams like the ones hidden in the tattered pages of fairy tales and teenage magazines on her bedroom shelf...
"That's why–" Whitney pulled Jasmine close into a hug "–don't hate me for this."
"What did you do?" Jasmine felt herself panicking at the thought of what Whitney could do.
"I may have helped change your plans for the next month. But it's work ordered by the League so you have to do it anyway." The girl began giggling in an uncomfortable manner which did not make Jasmine any less worried.
"And you'll still have time for fun," she said as she backed away with her bags before Jasmine could demand her to spill what horrible thing she had done this time.
It was like the city was finally taking revenge on him.
"Inevitable," Candice had said through the poketch. "With all the tinkering you do, power outages spreading to your gym were bound to happen. Tough luck."
There wasn't much he could that he hadn't done already, unfortunately. Not even the power of his electivire, jolteon, and luxray combined could revive the backup generators. It was only through the power of manual labour of devoted electricians and pokemon that the gym and the city would be back up and running.
Whenever that would be. He had to close the gym for the day. He might have to keep it closed for the next day. And, the next.
He had nothing to do–his paperwork was filed and finished to give him more time in the gym–so he wandered like a lost shinx through the city.
"Um...excuse me, do you happen to be the gym leader, Volkner?"
"Yes," he said. His eyes fell upon the unfamiliar girl standing in front of him, fidgeting. Then he spotted the pokeballs by her waist. "Wait. Before you say anything else, let's have a battle."
"What?" The girl looked startled.
"You're a trainer, aren't you?"
She nodded.
"Then let's go. Afraid this won't count for a badge though."
She nodded and readied her first pokeball, her gaze hardening as she stared him down.
He sent out his luxray and she, a skarmory and the battle began. After a couple of turns, he had to admit to two things. One, the pattern of her pokemon. All some sort of steel-type. Two, this was proving to be much more difficult than he thought it would be.
Then a third truth. This was proving to be one of the most enthralling matches he's had in a long time.
Still, he won, she lost.
But the determined light had not dimmed from her eyes even when her last pokemon fell, even when they shook hands afterwards. He was impressed, he mentioned, at how close of a match it was.
Then he was hit with two more truths.
One, this wasn't even her usual team. It was her contest team.
"What's your usual team?" he said in reply, his awe growing.
Two, it was her gym team.
She laughed, a gentle sound underpinned by a subtle current of sturdiness, while he spluttered his surprise.
Jasmine. From Johto. From Olivine, a seaside city just like Sunyshore with a great, big lighthouse too. Here on a cultural mission to strengthen ties between the two regions, apparently. She drew out the word 'apparently' as if there was something funny about it.
She had arrived in Canalave and made her way across the region, greeting gym leaders, seeing sights, and talking to locals. She had spent a great deal of time in Hearthome, to partake in her first contests and she had enjoyed them until she found herself longing for a taste of home so much that she couldn't enjoy them anymore and moved on.
"And then I came here. You were very busy so I didn't want to bother you but then I saw you walking and now, I've met you," she said. "I wanted to know, is the lighthouse open? I haven't got a chance to go and I'd love to."
It wasn't because of the power outage.
"Oh, it's not manned by a pokemon? Back home, we have an ampharos named Amphy and he's the most wonderful…"
Suddenly, she became animated, as she gushed about how he was the sweetest and how she would spend so much time in the lighthouse just because he was so excited to see her and how powerful he was to illuminate the seas at night by himself every night.
"...I'm sorry, I got carried away," she said, after stopping herself mid-sentence.
No need to be, no need at all. His ears had perked up at the genuine enthusiasm for electric pokemon and that was the end of this awkward beginning. They chatted on and on about pokemon, battle, machines (unsurprisingly, steel specialists know just a lot in that regard), life...they surprised each other with all their talking, he had to admit.
Before he knew it, the day had flown by.
The next day, the power returned most of the city. The power had not returned to his gym or the lighthouse (he really messed up this time with his poor handiwork, apparently). So he met with the intriguingly delicate, but tough girl again to hear her speak.
Before he knew it, the days have flown by.
One wouldn't expect sitting in long periods of silence, in between lively conversation, watching waves lap gently against the soft sand, reaching higher and higher as the hours of the day ticked by, to make days fly, but that was just what happened. It was never a lull into silence for lack of anything to say, rather, it was a pause of quiet where things unsaid were let unfettered in the motions of their hands, in the expression of their eyes, in the sighs when they watched the sea.
However, it could never hurt to break the silence because mistranslated messages of the unsaid were a common nuisance.
So Volkner, on the day the power came back (coincidentally, the day she was bound for home), asked oh-so-casually, ignoring the what-if's of being wrong, if she wanted to have dinner and go up the lighthouse.
"Yes," she said and her face lit up as the words sank in. "Yes."
This was the fairy tale moment of their lives and it was just like the stories have said, what Whitney has said, what magazines, movies, poems, all have said. She could practically see the fairy dust drifting around them but she knew the tiny sparkles that drifted lazily in the orange sky were simply sprays of the salty ocean below. Not that ocean sprays were any less beautiful or fitting for a classic scene from a movie. Hopefully.
He leaned his head forward and stopped and she wondered if he could feel the nervous energy rolling off her. Not for the first time, she wished that one of her pokemon were at her side at this very moment to distract her from the million fragmented lines of thought going haywire through her mind, which were displacing her usual steel-clad shell with a shaky girl in their wake.
He was still hesitating, not moving an inch further from his position. From her jumble of scattered thoughts, one emerged as an unfortunate, bolded headline.
Was she making him uneasy with her uneasiness?
Her delicately crafted stoicism had held firm throughout their whole...date, but she could feel it crumble as they stood alone at the top of the lighthouse so close that the scent of the sea was beginning to be replaced by an intoxicating mixture of spruce and fir and whatever else the cologne he was wearing was made of. Hmm, he had never seemed to use such things before (not that she purposefully noticed that sort of thing!) so why now?
Oh.
Just like that, a final realization struck and before another one could hold her back, she leaned in and felt her lips meet his, all the while raising her arms and letting her fingertips lightly graze the ends of his hair and the stubble along his jaw. The cologne was overpowering to her at this point but as soon as he reciprocated and ran a hand, with a slight tremble, through her hair, it was all so wonderfully right and familiar even though just like the cologne, it was completely foreign, uncharted territory.
That was because against a dying sun whose dirge was solemnly sung by wingull cries and crashing waves, against the cold, thin, metal railings at the top of the tower where the lights were just coming on for a night looking out to a pitch-black horizon, everything was what they hoped for and anguished for and longed to hold on for...forever.
It was a shame a sunset only lasted for so long.
(But it was what they've come to expect.)
"What's that?"
Jasmine slammed her hand down on the half-written paper and shuffled it into a messy pile with all the other work papers on her desk.
"Research papers," she said. How did that girl creep up behind her so quietly?
Whitney raised an eyebrow and crossed her arms. "I didn't know the League was interested in knowing more about 'date spots in Sunyshore City'." She giggled and lowered her voice. "Spill. Besides from contests, I know you were also spending time with a certain someone."
Jasmine felt her face heat up. "There is nothing to spill. I...It ended before it could even start."
"What? What do you mean? Jasmine, how do you mess that up? You got it all set up and it just fizzles–"
"Shhh." She put a finger up to quiet the overly-excited girl.
"I know you mean well but think about it. Long-distance just wouldn't work with how busy we are with our duties. And I'd miss home too much." Jasmine smiled half-heartedly.
"Aww, you'd miss me?" Whitney put her hands to her cheeks and fluttered her eyes. "I'd miss you. But if it were me in your place, I'd miss him so-o-o-o much that I'd move in a heartbeat."
"We have different priorities I suppose."
"When is that ever going to be a priority?" Whitney pointed at the messy pile of papers on her desk which she had shuffled earlier.
"I don't know."
"Then why do you still write them?"
"I-I don't know."
Three months? Or one year?
He gave up trying to count and as usual, walked back to his gym to finish his renovation plans. Until his feet decided to take him on a detour.
Volkner, I won't be able to make the trip today. Rusty is err...getting rusty and needs to be polished. I'm sorry.
That message came to him a couple of weeks after she had left for Olivine. He was working on installing the last solar panels at his gym to run the new switch panels when the wingull delivered the letter.
He slowed as he made his way through the market where vendors were selling their daily shipment of fresh produce and goods. It was packed with frantic activity and he was jostled around and stepped on so much that he cursed at himself for heading the wrong way.
Volkner, I can't come today. Amphy is incredibly sick. I need to stay with him until medicine arrives. I'm sorry.
Old fashioned, he said in his first letter back. Inefficient, he would have said, when technology would have sufficed. Kind of endearing, he added instead. It was a funny feeling, touching lightly-scented paper adorned with thick, inky letters amongst the hum of machinery and fluorescent lights.
Did he not get many fan letters? These words were slightly slanted as if she were laughing while writing.
He did, but anything delving into anything beyond what his favourite pokemon was and what his star sign was and what his type was (electric–did he really have to point it out?), was out of the ordinary.
The stand with the hot-pink banner, bubbly font, and glittery stars practically screamed for his attention as he approached it.
"We're selling seals! We have a buy three get half off deal… oh, why Leader Volkner, what a pleasant surprise!"
Volkner, I'm afraid I have to delay this trip again. I've missed too many days at the gym helping Amphy that there's a backlog of trainers who want to challenge me. I'm sorry.
It's too much, she had also written in this message. The vitamins were what Amphy needed but for her?
It was an impulsive thing, buying the bronzong nightlight.
For those times she wanted to stay in the lighthouse at night with Amphy, he had written when he had sent it.
"What's new?" he asked.
"Well, over here, we've just got a new batch of designs like this one which releases blue confetti and this one…"
Volkner, I really want to see you again. I do, I promise. But I understand if this is getting hard for you and if you want to… I mean if you really do… we don't have to continue like this…sorry.
"...but I have something special." The vendor leaned in close and pulled out a packet of seals from her pocket. "These seals I have here haven't even been released to the general public. But since it's you..."
He fiddled with the packaging which crinkled in his hand.
"Nevermind," he said.
No time to be spent window shopping.
Sometimes, during those few pockets of time where her world would stand still, Jasmine would look out the windows of her house by the very edge of the sea connecting Olivine to the rest of world and count the clouds and many blessings the world contained until she gave up.
After all, just as it was pointless to quantify all the hopelessness of the world, it was vain to think she could ever finish tallying up all the goodness that could ever exist.
So instead, in this one particular pocket of time, she drew on the thin layer of condensation settling on the windows, tallying up the hours until the sun would set.
At the moment of the setting sun, the ferry would set sail for a region far away.
Jasmine, I can't come today, papers have to be finished. Sorry.
Jasmine, I have to cancel this trip. Gym-related business again. I'm sorry.
An envelope on the window sill, roughly torn open, sat empty of its contents.
An errand for work, but a short visit too. To see you.
Before she headed back to her papers, the girl with the misty brown eyes took one last lingering look through the windows where the condensation drawings and tallies were melting away.
Two blue halves, for as far as her eyes could see, promised her a boat from a region far away. It wasn't a promise of forever, because no sooner than it would deliver, it would take away, but it must be a promise of something, because it would always, always come again.
And it was enough, she lamented. When at the mercy of the whims of the waves, anything was always enough.
'Forever' did not exist in their language of love.
(But it was what they've always accepted.)