contains: swearing, sexual references - no explicit situations;
established Huntershipping - Gold/Silver game!verse - so not quite the same as PreciousMetalShipping;
set about a year after the events of HeartGold/SoulSilver;

if you are interested, it is also set in the same continuity as other Gold/Silver fics I have written!

ooo

Chapter One
In which... not much actually happens, but we begin the Pokemon adventures!

ooo

"BOO!" said Ethan right as he surprised Silver with a hug.

Needless to say, it being a surprise, Silver was surprised. His first reaction was to give an undignified yelp and jump like a startled cat, and his second reaction was to cover up the yelp with a cough and elbow Ethan in the gut.

"Ow!"

"... sorry," muttered Silver.

"No-one else punches me for hugging them!"

"You shouted right in my ear! I thought something was attacking me, dumbass."

"Whatever." Ethan waved his hand vaguely. "Excuses, excuses... but anyway, back to what I was gonna say, I bet you can't guess what I bought today!"

"What did you buy?" asked Silver warily.

(The last time Ethan had surprised him with a gift, it had turned out to be a pink flowery envelope with a note inside reading, 'I want to HARDEN! I wanted people to look at my ONIX! COME ON! ME FIRST!'

"This is awful," Silver had said, smacking Ethan with the mail.

"Do you get it!?" Ethan had replied with a manic grin. "Also, these mail thingies cost a lot, you should be grateful! And it's really hard to get a decent message with the phrases they give you, I spent like half an hour trying to say 'penis' without saying 'penis'. Just think of the effort, Silver. So much effort."

"I don't get this last part..."

"C'mon, read it out."

"... come on me first?"

"Yeaaah, that's so hot.")

Ethan waved off his concerns with another flamboyant hand gesture. "Weeeell, I was going to get you some more sexy mail but they didn't have any of the gay floral print ones left, so I got you something slightly less awesome... new Pokemon games from Game Freak!"

"Hey, that is pretty cool," said Silver, getting up and peering into the plastic shopping bag. "I didn't even know there were even any new ones coming out."

"They're called HeartGold and SoulSilver, and guess what..."

"What?" said Silver once it was clear that Ethan was going to leave him hanging in suspense indefinitely.

"..."

"What?"

"... they star me! And you. Probably. Yeah, I'm pretty sure you're in them too. But they star me! How cool is that?!"

"Are you serious?" Silver couldn't decide whether that was indeed cool, or funny, or just plain stupid. He decided on all three.

"It's SO cool! It's the coolest of all things cool!"

"Why would anyone would to make a game starring you?"

"Oh, I dunno, maybe because I'm the Champion and I'm just that fucking amazing?" Ethan posed in a suitably dramatic fashion. He was pretty sure that Silver was joking – after all, the company Game Freak was famed for developing new games based on the life stories of every Champion of every region yet – but Ethan never turned down the opportunity to pose dramatically.

"And wait, did you just say that I'm also in them?"

"Yeah, maybe, I thought I saw a little video game you in the screenshots. I don't think you're a STARRING CHARACTER though, sorry."

"... I don't remember giving permission for this..."

"Uh, actually... you did. At least, the person who faked your signature on the legal copyright whatsits did. Because you were away for two weeks training with Lance and I just wanted them to start making my game, okay?"

"Hey," said Silver, narrowing his eyes in suspicion, "is this another one of those games starring me and you? Like the one we found in that... adult... store last time?"

"Oh yeah, that was great," said Ethan, nostalgically thinking about it.

"Is it one of those games?"

"No!" Ethan said, returning to the present. "Game Freak is a family friendly company! I don't even think it has any romance at all in this. Which is really disappointing, actually."

"Good."

"Pah!"

Silver glared, but pulled out one of the game cases anyway. He looked at it critically. "Is that supposed to be you? Is that supposed to be me? What the hell is this? My hair doesn't look like that! I look like a moron."

"I look awesome as usual," Ethan said. "Of course, that's because nothing can go wrong if it involves me. Of course."

"Shut up," Silver said, showing him the back of the case. "Look, you look pretty stupid too. Are those flared shorts you're wearing?"

"Shorts are the best," said Ethan defensively. No-one was allowed to criticise the shorts! He'd been wearing them since he was a youngster, and he definitely wasn't going to give them up just yet.

ooo

"Have you found it yet?" shouted Silver in the general direction of the bedroom. There was a crash and a muffled 'OOWWW nooo sorry about that', and then Ninetales stalked out of the room looking haughty and carrying a hairbrush.

"Ninetaaales," she said, deigning to sit on the sofa next to Silver. She flicked one of her tails over at his face – it was noticeably messed up and was sporting a muddy footprint. Then she flung the hairbrush onto Silver's lap.

"Ask nicely," grumbled Silver. There was a brief stare-off between moody stubborn human and moody stubborn Pokemon.

"Grr... ninetales, tales?" said Ninetales, looking slightly sheepish but mostly 'I can't believe I'm bending to this level, human'.

Silver gave her another glare before picking up the footprint-stamped tail and attempting to brush the fur back into its usual gleaming perfection. He was getting practiced at this, possibly having put too many hours into styling his own hair over the years. Whenever he'd suggested that Ninetales should just try and teach Ethan to brush her, she'd given him a look of absolute horror. And whenever he'd complained to Ethan about his completely reformed non-abusive Pokemon training being exploited for Ninetales's personal styling every morning, Ethan had just grinned and told him that it would be good bonding for both of them.

And also Silver wasn't sure that Ethan knew what a hairbrush was.

"I found it!" yelled Ethan triumphantly. He bounded back into the room, brandishing a rather dirty-looking DS.

"Where was it?"

"In my underwear drawer!"

"Alright."

Since Ethan had moved in (with his suitcase full of various 'cool' patterns of boxers, briefs and everything in between), the list of things found in underwear drawers had extended to a five-page essay including chips, Pokeballs, empty ketchup bottles, Caterpies, teddy bears, underwear, four of Ninetales's fur brushes, and a whole stash of rare candy. Silver had long given up being surprised at what Ethan dug up from there.

"Okay, you got yours? Charger? Glasses? Snacks? Drinks? We're gonna be marathon-ing this, by the way. Hopefully it won't take as long as that Final Fantasy one..."

"Yes to all of those except glasses," Silver said. "I hate those things."

"... ta-da!" Ethan held up some glasses. "Sorry, they were also in the underwear drawer."

"I said, I hate those things!"

"Yes, but you need to wear them otherwise you'll GO BLIND, so shut up and wear them."

There was a scuffle as Ethan leant over the back of Silver's sofa in an attempt to get the glasses on his face. Ninetales leapt up, snarling at both of them, and marched out of the room.

"Get off me!"

"DO YOU WANT TO GO BLIND?!"

Silver made an indistinct sound of pure anger and struggled to get out of Ethan's grasp. Unfortunately, the struggling only made Ethan's grip around his neck tighter, which was not good for his air inhalation status.

"Stop struggling and deal with it!" Ethan said.

"Mmmgrhrgrh!" said Silver, throwing himself forwards off the sofa so that Ethan was pulled into, and then onto, it. He didn't actually make it off the sofa though, because of course Ethan's arm was still around his neck. And now it was worse, because dragging Ethan on top of the sofa really meant dragging Ethan on top of him, which meant his only escape route had been closed off.

"Aha!"

"Can't... breathe..."

"Sorry," said Ethan, unwrapping his arm from Silver's neck. He slid the glasses onto Silver's face. "Don't take them off!"

"Fuck off."

"This is quite comfortable actually," Ethan loudly proclaimed. "In fact, I could probably stay here forever, watching you wear your glasses. Forever and ever, while I pin down your hands so you can't take them off."

The attempted headbutt from Silver turned into a general struggle for freedom, because Ethan had unfortunately moved his head away from headbutting range. Ethan was surprisingly heavy.

"Ferali rali fergatr?" said Feraligatr, poking his head into the doorway. Have you started playing yet?

"No because Silver's being a whiny prick!" shouted Ethan back at the doorway.

Feraligatr shrugged, growled something that presumably translated to, "Hurry up and finish having sex with him because I want to see the game already," and stomped back out into the kitchen.

"He's got a point," said Ethan. "I want to see the game already too."

"You're the one on top of me," Silver pointed out.

"Exactly!"

"... no, that doesn't make any sense."

Ethan grinned and kissed him. Then he rolled off and fell on the floor. "Oof."

Silver kicked him.

"You'd better keep those glasses on," threatened Ethan, "or... I'll... something. Yeah, I'll get the Pokemart delivery guy to deliver you fifty bloom mails with suggestive Onix phrases in each one. In public. And read them all out loud to you."

"Whatever," growled Silver. "Let's just get started already."

"Okay! Yeah! Let's do it! Yeahhh!"

Silver picked up one of the game cases, this one a shiny silver box with a cartoon Lugia on the front. "I suppose it makes sense if I play this SoulSilver one and you take the other game."

"Yup yup, that does make sense. S'got your name on it." Ethan opened the other case, took out the cartridge and looked around for his DS.

Silver, being slightly more organised, had already started the game.

"Slow down," moaned Ethan, watching him watching the video introduction. "Oooh look, that's where my pony princess game went! I forgot it was still inside the DS..."

"That's disgusting," said Silver. He was staring at the (pink and glittery) cartridge in Ethan's hand with pure, undiluted horror.

"You're just jealous of my pony brushing skills," said Ethan airily. "Anyway, don't start yet! I still gotta load this."

"You can't even brush your own Ninetales."

The game loaded. Ethan stared at the "GAME FREAK" logo in fascination.

"Just press A!"

"But I wanna watch the video!"

Silver leant over and pressed A for him. "There. Start a new game, and hurry up."

ooo

Half an hour later, Feraligatr and Meganium wandered into the living room to check if their humans had met game-Feraligatr and game-Meganium yet.

"No! You can't call me 'Cockhed'! Veto! Veto!" Ethan shouted, trying to wrestle Silver's DS away from him.

"Why not? It goes really well with this character design, I think."

"You can't even spell!"

"Blame the character limit," said Silver. He pulled the DS away from Ethan, as well as their beer cans (which were getting dangerously close to being knocked over by Ethan). "How about just 'Cock' then?"

"Silverrrr! Stop being mean to me! Feraligatr, help me!"

Feraligatr and Meganium looked at each other. "Call us back when you've met Professor Elm," said Feraligatr in Feraligatr-language. Meganium beamed at all of them.

And then they left.

"Feraligatr!" howled Ethan. "Come back and tell me I'm not a cockhead!"

"Why am I even playing as you anyway?" wondered Silver.

"Wha...? Because I'm awesome, whaddaya mean?"

"No, I'm going to play as Lyra."

"What? No! You can't do that! I bought you a game starring me and you repay me by not being me?!"

"You're already playing as you," said Silver. "You see, clearly we need to get the full experience of these games, so I'm playing as the other character."

Ethan gaped. "But... Lyra's not even the Champion! I don't even know why she's in the game!"

"Lyra has Ho-oh, what do you have?"

"Like, fourteen trophies and Champion titles? C'mon man, just be Cockhed!"

"Too late. You vetoed that, remember?" said Silver, selecting the picture of Lyra in response to Oak's question. He adjusted his glasses, critically inspecting Lyra's outfit and hairstyle.

"But you can't be Lyra, that just doesn't work! Dude, you're not even a girl. Look at Oak, you're just confusing him!"

"Yes, that might be because I'm not literally the game character."

"Hey man, I'm even willing to take back the Cockhed veto! Just be me! Come on!"

"But Lyra looks better than you."

"Fine! Rude!" said Ethan. He threw up his hands in mock exasperation. "Be like that. Ungrateful bastard." He picked his own DS back up and took out the stylus, ready to enter his own character's name.

"What are you calling yourself?" Silver asked, looking down at Ethan's screen. He was trying to think of a good name for Lyra without actually calling himself Lyra, because that would be a bit too strange.

"Big dick."

"Huh?"

"My name's big dick."

"As in, your name is literally 'Big Dick?"

"Actually it's 'BIGDICK' because I can't work out how to get small letters, and because I can't fit in a space," explained Ethan sadly.

"I'm going to veto that one," said Silver, torn between laughing at him and hitting him. He took a mouthful of beer instead.

"It's a very descriptive name! It really suits me. I mean, him. All the bitches have Mr BIGDICK on their Pokegear speed-dial! All the gay dudes, too."

Silver thought briefly about saying, "No, it doesn't suit you, and I know that for a fact," before deciding that that was too mean, even for him.

"Cockhed suits you more," he said out loud.

"Nah, no-one has Mr Cockhead on their speed-dial. That would be stupid."

"Do you know anyone who has BIGDICK on their speed dial?"

"Yeah, I do actually!" said Ethan proudly. "Me!"

Silver narrowed his eyes. "Ethan..."

"Hey, don't look at me like that! It's not like that! I just... registered you as BIGDICK..."

"What?!"

"Sheesh, it's a compliment! I mean, it's a compliment now! And... you were kinda a big dick back when I registered you..."

Silver was at a loss for words.

"... so actually maybe I should just call you that once I get to name you in the game, instead of me?" said Ethan thoughtfully.

"...huh?"

"Yeah, apparently you can name game-you as well," he told Silver. "That's what Ninetales said, at least. Anyway, why do you wanna veto Mr BIGDICK? He's awesome!"

"First thing, change my name on your Pokegear! You know everyone can see everything on that massive screen!" Silver said, his mind breaking under the implications of him broadcasting his crotch measurements to everyone who'd ever seen Ethan's Pokegear.

"Exactly!"

"No!"

"Exactly!"

"What? No!"

"Eeexactly!"

Silver gave up. He made a mental note to ask Gengar to steal or sabotage Ethan's Pokegear when he had the chance. "Humph. Look, just don't call yourself BIGDICK in the game, alright? I thought you wanted to battle online. Kids are going to be there."

"I'll just be impressing their impressionable young minds," said Ethan, looking very proud of himself.

"Their parents will arrest you."

"C'mon, wouldn't you be impressed if I introduced myself to you as Professor BIGDICK?"

"You're not a professor, and, uh, you're past the stage of impressing me with your... size."

"Stop being mean to me..." grumbled Ethan. He erased the name on his DS screen. "Okay, I'm gonna be... DR DUDE."

Silver snorted. He decided not to tell Ethan how to use lowercase letters; it was much more fun watching him try to figure it out himself. "Doctor... dude?"

"He's a doctor of dudes."

"Right."

"Also, he's a real dude. And a doctor."

"Good," said Silver distractedly. "I'll call Lyra Lyra, I suppose."

"Nooo! That's too boring! At least call her BIGDICK!"

"That makes even less sense than calling you that!"

"Or you."

"Well, yes," said Silver, feeling a bit awkward. "But not Lyra."

"How about just BIG D then?"

"That still means the same thing..."

"But it's more kid-friendly though!"

"Urgh..."

"How about SAUSAGE? Or BUTTS? Or BIGONIX? Or IM MALE? Or BOOBS? Or BOSOM? Or-"

"Feraligatr!" shouted Feraligatr, stomping into the room. "Ferali! Gatr!"

"Okay, okay!" shouted Ethan back. "We're gonna start soon! Just tell Silver to name Lyra BIG D, okay?"

"Ligatr, gateeerr!" Feraligatr thrust a threatening fist in front of Silver's face.

"Hmph," snorted Silver. He typed in 'Sausage'. "Happy now?"

"Gatr," rumbled Feraligatr. He picked up a clawful of pretzels and sat down to watch the games.

ooo

It was a warm sunny day, and the start of a new adventure. Confounded by Professor Oak's confusion over the gender of a teenager who was literally standing right in front of him, the universe had recently split into two parallel baby universes.

In one of them, a boy named DR DUDE was walking around his room bumping into walls, desk and more walls, shouting something about not understanding the controls and where the hell were the stairs.

In the other, a girl named Sausage was talking to her mother in the kitchen. She was about to start her Pokemon journey, and just needed to get her starter and say goodbye to her hometown. It was an exciting day, and she was eager to meet the handsome, amazing, strong, wonderful, legend of a trainer named Silver that she'd heard so much about.

("And you call me egoistic, Silver?" said Ethan.)

Their story had finally begun.

ooo

a/n: I'm going to be very busy for the next few months, so after the next chapter (which I've already written) I'm not sure when I can update! Oh well. As for actual author's notes related to the story:

1. I'm not sure whether to do an established relationship between Gold and Silver, as I've been doing, or to have a relationship at all, because the whole point of this fic is them playing HeartGold/SoulSilver in universe, not them being a couple. But. Um. How can anyone not like Gold/Silver, ho ho ho.
2. My first Pokemon trainer was called Hooker. I think Silver got off lightly, considering. I also spent far too long trying to construct a good Mail for Ethan in that first flashback :S.
3. This was originally intended to be a oneshot, but then I got to 3000 words and they'd only just named their characters, so... this is going to be epic... if I finish this...