A Cavern at the Top of the World
In a cavern at the top of the world, he stood, silent and stoic. She had travelled all of Johto and Kanto, becoming stronger, earning badges, hoping she would find him. She had never expected he would be here, on this lonely mountain, detached from everyone.
She'd fought long and hard to gain access to this mountain, but seeing him here had reduced her to her knees. Leaf was lost for words, her old friend, who she had trained by in her youth, had annexed himself from the world entirely and never even told her why. He hadn't told anyone he would go. He just went off the map. His mother was in pieces.
"Red!" Leaf's cry was choked with tears, relieved and angry all at once. How could he just have left her? What right did he have to claim this cold mountain for himself and shut everyone out? He didn't respond. He didn't even turn around.
"I needed to become stronger than anyone else. I needed to be away from all of you. Being a trainer, it's all that I have." Red's voice sounded broken and fraught, as if he had not used it in a long time. He still didn't turn to her, gazing out toward the blizzard.
"You had it all! You were the League Champion! You had glory, you had money, you had your family! You had me!"
"You don't understand do you? You've never understood. I couldn't stay there in that stuffy room, fighting the same old overconfident egocentric hotshot trainers who thought beating the four made them the best in the land. I had to travel, Leaf, I had to wander, I had to find the strongest trainers I could and prove to myself I was worthy of that title."
"So why are you holed up here, in this empty cave, at the peak of a restricted mountain? You could have told us, I would have understood! I could have been a training partner, like the good old days when we brought down the Rockets."
"I realised that the strongest trainer in the world was me, and I lost all sense of purpose. I thought, anyone who can reach me here must be a worthy opponent. I had to keep training, stronger than any other could be. There wasn't a place for you in the kind of existence I sought."
"Has there ever been a place for me in your life?" Her voice was strained and bitter. She had come so far, to be told she was nothing to him. She'd followed him all her life, from Pallet Town to this cavern at the top of the world, to be told she didn't belong in his world. "When you first disappeared, I decided to travel, to earn all the badges of Johto, to challenge Lance again and become Champion myself. I had always hoped to find you, to show you what I had achieved, to be strong like you always were. I've admired you since were were kids, Red. I've idolized you, followed you, strove to be as good as you. And I get here, I get to the top of this frozen bloody rock, after defeating every trainer in the two regions, to be told that after all my effort I'm still not enough?"
"Leaf, I didn't mean it like that-"
"Well, here I am Red. Here's that worthy opponent you've spent three years waiting for."
"I don't want to fight you Leaf."
"I don't want to love you, Red, but I didn't get a choice in that."
"Leaf…" He turned to her at last, those brown eyes seeming aged beyond their years. He wore the same worn cap and jacket as he had done when she'd last seen him, over threadbare jeans and sneakers falling apart from walking for so long. He was taller, and his face was beginning to lose its boyish charm, but to Leaf, he was just as she'd remembered. "I'm sorry I shut you out,"
"Please tell me there's a place for me in your existence now, because I can't walk down this mountain knowing that all this has been for nothing." He walked over to her, head bowed, and took her hand in his.
In a cavern at the top of the world, the two most powerful trainers in the world stood in silence, together again.
Set in the HG/SS/G/S/C era, obviously. I know that canonically, Leaf and Red are only like 13-14 by this point in time, but I've always imagined them older. I think this works better if you suspend canon for a while and imagine them around 16 years of age. Or if you like, just believe Red stayed in that cavern long after Gold/Kris defeated him. Originally published on my tumblr vivelagiygas.