Author's Note: There aren't nearly enough fanfics for the Diamond and Pearl Adventure manga, and that makes me sad. My brother and I got into a discussion about DPA the other day, and between that and another, unrelated discussion with the bro about "poor rivals who can never catch up to the main characters, no matter how good they are in their own right," somehow this fic came into being. Complete with new adventures, Eevee being the most adorable being in existence, LakeAcuityShipping, kinda tsundere Mitsumi (Mi-tsun-mi?), and an overused running gag involving Hareta and badges that look tasty.
Note that my mom accidentally sold my copies of the manga along with some old books a couple years ago, so I haven't read DPA in a while, so blame any inaccuracies on my mother. Or, you know, blame me since it would still be my fault.
Also note that I did not, in fact, write this fic with the intention of it being a Christmas gift to the DPA fandom; I just happened to finish it on Christmas Eve, and although it could probably stand to be polished a little, now the idea of publishing it by Christmas sounds too appealing to pass up. So... merry Christmas, I guess?
Despite all of his many talents, Jun had always had a bad habit of coming on too strong when it came to Mitsumi.
He also had a bad habit of getting rejected by Mitsumi, no matter how close to winning her heart he'd mistaken himself to be. And more often than not, those rejections came with a complimentary side of pain. She'd turned him down five times, just since the conclusion of the conflict with Team Galactic. He didn't even tryto figure out how many times she'd scorned his affections before that. It made his head hurt.
Mostly because of the memory of all the times that her fist had collided with his face.
The first time, post-Galactic—well, Jun had been traversing Sinnoh for over two months without crossing paths with his rival and Mitsumi. He'd been doggedly focused on filling up the National Pokédex for Professor Rowan. It was satisfying work, certainly an adventure. But still, he'd missed the company of his friends. Even that livewire Hareta.
Jun was a lost cause the second he spotted them en route to Floaroma Town. They were far ahead of him—but when weren't they?—but even in the distance, they were unmistakable. Hareta, with his cap askew on his head, laughing as he barreled down the path on the back of his Luxray.
And sprinting after him—"Hareta, can't you wait up for once?"—was Mitsumi. She was clearly exhausted, her scarf undone and her long green ponytail askew, but she was still the most stunning creature that Jun had ever laid eyes on. And he had seen Dialga, Palkia, and Giratina in the flesh.
"Mitsumi, Hareta, wait for me!"
Mitsumi skidded to a stop, though if Jun had been honest with himself, it was probably because she welcomed any excuse to stop running. Not because she was particularly eager to see him again.
"Mitsumi! It's been too long!" He flung his arms around her—though a sharp elbow to the ribs from Mitsumi swiftly knocked him back. Punching Jun was just as much a habit for Mitsumi as asking her out and coming on too strong were habits for him.
"It hasn't been long enough," she muttered.
He pretended not to hear. "You look even more beautiful than the last time I saw you."
Her eyes narrowed. "I'm covered in sweat, Jun."
"That does nothing to change my love for you."
Mitsumi elbowed him again, in the other side this time. "I swear, Hareta hasn't slowed down for even a second since we started off this morning. I could go for some coffee right now."
"I'll go with you."
"On second thought, I'll pass on the coffee." She paused, her gaze cutting over to the wild boy, still charging ahead. "Hareta! Come back!"
He didn't seem to hear her. He was still laughing at something, probably something that his Pokémon had said. Hareta understood Pokémon more clearly than people sometimes.
"Hareta," Jun yelled, "If you don't come back, I'm going to fine you a million dollars! And you know you don't have any money!"
Once he finally noticed that his name was being called, Hareta swung his Luxray around and dismounted beside Jun and Mitsumi. "Oh, hey, Jun! When did you get here?"
"About a minute ago," said Mitsumi. "He's been hitting on me ever since."
"You've been hitting back," Jun said, massaging his sore sides.
"Yet you still haven't gotten the picture."
He shrugged. "So are you two heading to Floaroma Town, too?"
"Yep!" said Hareta. He patted Luxray on the head. They walked slowly up the inclined path now, so the electric Pokémon had a chance to catch its breath. "We're gonna stop at the Pokémon Center and give our Pokémon a rest. It's been a while since we've been here."
"I'll say. That's where we met, remember? Or at least, that's where you met me. I'd seen you before, in Oreburgh."
Mitsumi's brow furrowed. "Were you stalking us?"
"No!" Jun protested. "I was just passing through, and I caught the tail end of Hareta's battle with Roark." He grinned. "And then, he tried to eat the Coal Badge…."
"It didn't taste very good," Hareta lamented.
"My point is," said Jun, "It was kind of a spectacle. How could I not stop and check it out? Especially since I'd heard about both of you from Professor Rowan. I was already looking forward to meeting you."
A sweet scent wafted toward them. As they crested the hill, a vast field of vibrant flowers burst into view. Mitsumi gasped softly despite herself, her eyes sparkling. Hareta grinned and took off into the field at a gallop, his arms windmilling.
"Sheesh," said Jun. "Doesn't he ever get tired?"
"The day he does, I'll be sure to alert the media," Mitsumi said. She watched Hareta—and Luxray—prance through the field, with her hands on her hips. There were faint circles underneath her eyes, and Jun figured that any traveling companion of Hareta's probably didn't get a good night's rest every night. But even so, there was a tiny smile on Mitsumi's face.
She appeared to be in a good mood, and Jun hadn't seen her or Hareta in ages, and he'd really missed her. So that was why he couldn't resist giving it another shot.
Okay, so Jun could never resist giving it another shot. Some people might have called it a character flaw.
"Hey, Mitsumi?" he said slowly. "Since this is the place where we first met, and it'd be nice to catch up, since we haven't seen each other for so long…"
"No."
"But I didn't even—"
"Still no."
"You didn't even let me finish!"
Mitsumi rolled her eyes. "Fine, go ahead."
"So because of those things," he said, "I was wondering if you wanted to have dinner with me while your Pokémon are resting at the Pokémon Center." He plucked a flower from the soil at his feet—a tiny red one—and held it out to her. "What do you say?"
"No."
Somehow, even though it was the same result he got every time, Jun was still a bit surprised. "Aw, why not?"
"You're honestly asking me that question?" She sighed, turning back to Hareta. "Come on, you're going to drive Luxray to the point of exhaustion! I thought we were going to let our Pokémon rest up while we're in town!"
"Oh, yeah!" Hareta stopped still, throwing an arm around Luxray. "Sorry, buddy. Let's get going." He waved goodbye over his shoulder as he and Mitsumi left for the Pokémon Center. "See you around, Jun! Maybe we can have a battle next time!"
"Challenge accepted!" Jun called after him. He stood there in the field until they were out of sight, the flower slowly drooping in his hand.
Mitsumi and Hareta went on their way, but Hareta kept steering the conversation back to his next battle with Jun. "I wonder what kinds of cool new Pokémon he's befriended since last time!" he chattered beside her. "It's always nice to see him because that means I can battle him!"
"If you say so."
Despite what her habit of pummeling him might have indicated, Mitsumi didn't hate Jun. After all, he hadrescued her precious Eevee—not to mention Hareta and Mitsumi herself—from the Team Galactic headquarters once. And his devotion to his Pokémon was admirable. If not for a certain factor, Mitsumi might have liked to be his friend.
Except that Jun insisted on asking her out. Frequently. And had a bad habit of declaring his undying love for her. Often. He really wasn't capable of taking a hint. Not even when that hint came in the form of a one-hit KO.
So more often than not, when the subject of Jun was broached, Mitsumi found herself hoping that she and Hareta wouldn't run into him anytime soon, even as her traveling companion vocally hoped for the opposite.
He always reappeared eventually, though. If Mitsumi didn't know better, she would have assumed that he really was stalking them.
Jun wasn't stalking them. He just had an uncanny ability to run into them when he was going about his business. For example, he'd run into Hareta—literally—last week, though Mitsumi had been away buying supplies at the time. Hareta had reminded Jun that he'd promised him a battle, and the rest was history.
It wasn't that Jun was a weak Trainer. He'd carefully raised his team until they were capable enough to take down some of the most powerful Trainers around. It was just that Hareta was too strong. He was always a few steps ahead, a few vast inches out of reach.
Still stinging a bit from his loss against Hareta, Jun was currently working on filling his National Pokédex. After all, Hareta had been entrusted with one, as well, and he wasn't going to let his rival get any farther ahead of him. No chance.
Jun's quest to fill the National Dex had carried him to exciting new destinations and led to a few epic battles (more wins than losses, just never against his rival), but today, it brought him to the Contest Hall. There were always a couple of interesting Pokémon participating in Contests. He briefly entertained the thought of competing in a Contest himself—except he hadn't forgotten last time he'd tried with Staraptor, still a Staravia back then, and been disqualified. It would be humiliating if that happened again.
"Maybe next time," he said to Staraptor as he dismounted from the bird Pokémon's back and called it back into its Pokéball.
He had just set foot in the Contest Hall when a Pokémon's cry caught his attention. "Vee-vee!"
A ball of tan fur emerged from the throng of Contest-goers, zigzagging around people's legs and almost tripping a pair of elegantly dressed ladies in the process. The Eevee stopped at Jun's feet with a cry of greeting. The Evolution Pokémon had a big ribbon tied around its neck. Jun would know this particular Pokémon anywhere. Aside from the fact that it was fortunate enough to belong to the love of his life, he'd saved its life once. And unlike its Trainer, Eevee actually seemed fond of Jun.
"Eevee, where are you going?" A familiar figure burst through the crowd—Mitsumi, wearing a fancy new dress and holding up the hem around her ankles in order to pursue her Pokémon. Hareta was right behind her with an unshakeable grin.
Eevee looked back at its Trainer with a cute smile. "Vee!" It bounded onto Mitsumi's shoulder with one graceful leap.
"Eevee just wanted to say hello to its friend, Mitsumi," Hareta explained.
Jun moved forward in order to pat Eevee's head. And totally not because it put him in close proximity to Mitsumi. That was just the sweet icing on top of the metaphorical cake. "Nice to see you again. It feels like it's been forever!"
"It's been three weeks," said Mitsumi.
"Like I said, forever."
Hareta grinned up at Jun. "Are you here to take on another Contest? Mitsumi wouldn't let me."
"The judges saw you walking into the building and looked like they wanted to flee the region," said Mitsumi. "They haven't forgotten about what happened the last time you were here."
"I just came here to watch." Jun pulled his National Pokédex out of his bag. "I was hoping to see a few new Pokémon competing in the Contest."
"The Contest ended fifteen minutes ago," Mitsumi told him. "Eevee did an amazing job." She smiled at her favorite Eevee, still perched on her shoulder. Despite Mitsumi's past in Team Galactic and the way she'd been raised, she cared about her Pokémon a great deal. That much was obvious from the way her eyes brightened whenever she looked at one of them. Mitsumi's love for her Pokémon was one of her most admirable traits, even more admirable than her beauty.
Jun smiled his most charming smile. "How about we go out for dinner to commemorate your big win? My treat."
"Do we have to go through this every time we run into each other?" she asked.
"Ooh, I love dinner!" Hareta piped up.
"Um… I actually just meant me and Mitsumi. Like a dinner date."
"I had a lot of dinner dates back in the forest," Hareta said with a wide smile.
"Wait, what?" said Jun and Mitsumi—almost in two-part harmony.
"Yeah," he said. "You know, dates? They're fruits, kind of sweet? I ate them a lot: breakfast, lunch, and dinner dates."
"Oh," said Mitsumi. "That makes a lot more sense."
Jun chuckled. "That's not the kind of date I was talking about. I was talking about a romantic date at a restaurant. One of those nice ones with fancy place mats and candles."
"Do they let you draw on the menus?" Hareta asked.
"Not even a little."
"Then no thanks," said the boy. "I'd rather stick with my idea of dinner dates."
"No thanks," Mitsumi echoed. "I'd rather—well—not go out with you in the near future."
"How about the distant future?"
"I wouldn't bet on it."
"Oh." Jun stepped back out of reach of her arms, just in case. He was still holding his National Pokédex, after all. It would be a shame if something bad happened to it after all of his hard work. "So, uh… how'd the Contest go?"
"It was exciting. We had to pull out all the stops to win. There were a lot of talented Pokémon," said Mitsumi. She glanced down at the National Dex in his hands. "But probably nothing that you didn't already have in your Pokédex."
"I have seen a lot of amazing Pokémon lately," he boasted.
"Really? What kinds? Can I see?" asked Hareta. He whipped out his own Pokédex. "I know, let's see which one of us has seen more Pokémon! Kind of like a battle… except different."
Jun had worked hard to fill so much of his National Dex, so of course he'd be able to beat Hareta in this competition. He opened his Pokédex, and he and Hareta compared them side by side.
"Hareta, wait—y-you've seen how many Pokémon?"
"This many," said Hareta, pointing to the number of entries. Jun figured that he hadn't learned to count quite that high yet. He had been raised in the forest, after all.
Jun couldn't help but slump with disappointment. I… lost. All of his efforts, and the younger boy had still managed to find several more Pokémon than him. Probably through sheer luck, too.
Hareta must have noticed the expression on his rival's face, because he gave him a thumbs-up. "You've seen a whole lot of Pokémon, too. I bet you've had a lot of fun tracking them down!"
He grinned. "That's true."
"And I know how you can find way more!"
"How?"
"Hareta…" Mitsumi started.
But the boy was already chattering away, his words firing off faster than a Fury Swipes attack, so swift that it took a moment before they registered with Jun. "You can come with us to Unova! The professor there is friends with Gramps, so we're going there to see lots of Unova Pokémon. It'll be a big adventure! Wanna come?"
The chance to see and catch all kinds of new Pokémon, train them until they were strong enough to beat Hareta in a battle, and win Mitsumi's heart? Of course he wanted to go to Unova!
"That's a silly question."
Mitsumi couldn't say that she wasn't slightly relieved when Jun split off from her and Hareta not long after their arrival in Unova. But before that, they were each given a Unova starter Pokémon by Professor Juniper.
Hareta was eager to test the abilities of his new friend Snivy. Predictably, he chose to go about this by challenging Jun to a battle. Mitsumi noticed that Jun waited to select his Pokémon until Hareta had, and then, he picked Tepig, the starter who had the type advantage over Hareta. Well, they are rivals, after all.
Nonetheless, Hareta always had that advantage—that inexplicable ability to form an instant connection with his Pokémon and, through that, overcome any challenge. The margin was narrow, but Hareta and Snivy won the battle. And made a wreck of the professor's lab in the process.
"That was fun!" Hareta declared, scooping up Snivy in his arms.
"We almost beat you," said Jun. The boys were laughing as they had to clean up Professor Juniper's lab, but Mitsumi wondered if Jun didn't look just the slightest bit disappointed.
Of course, it was probably nothing, and none of her business.
Even though they had gone their separate ways shortly afterward, Jun still crossed paths with Hareta and Mitsumi fairly often. It was only natural, since they had the same goals—exploring the Unova region, discovering new Pokémon, and growing stronger.
He battled Hareta again in Castelia City, using new Pokémon that they had caught in Unova, but Jun still lost. Hareta and his team were formidable, and his ability to bond so deeply with his Pokémon companions always gave him an edge.
Jun hadn't asked Mitsumi out again since they had arrived in Unova. It wasn't that he didn't want to go on a date with her—because he really, really did—it was the fact that she always turned him down. There had to be something that he was doing wrong.
It hit him on his way to Nimbasa City. He needed to think bigger than fancy place mats and restaurants where you didn't color on the menus. Some grand, romantic gesture would win Mitsumi's heart for sure!
So he planned it all out, and when he inevitably ran into Mitsumi and Hareta following Hareta's triumphant battle against Gym Leader Elesa, he made his move.
"Mitsumi?" He strolled up to them with a heavy picnic basket in his hand and a grin on his face. "Can I ask you a question?"
A strange, pinched expression took over her face, like she'd just heard a painfully off-key note or Hareta was emitting a particularly bad smell. She thought he was going to ask her out again—impulsively, casually. But that was the old Jun, who had been thinking too small, too simple. She had no inkling of the fantastic evening that he had planned.
"By now, you have to know how much I love you."
"That's not a question at all," she grumbled.
"No, it's not. It's the most unquestionable thing in the world. So would you do me the honor of accompanying me on a date tonight?"
She gritted her teeth—though at least she was getting over that agonizing habit of hitting him every time he flirted with her. "Come on, you'd gotten so much better about not asking me out every single time that we meet."
"But just listen, Mitsumi! I have it all planned out! We'll watch the Pokémon Musical together—it's kind of like a contest; you'll love it, I promise—and then, we can ride on the Ferris wheel. I hear the view is spectacular. And then, we can have a nice picnic on Torterra's back. I packed a basket, and there's enough food for all of your Pokémon, too, and it will be the most wonderful, romantic date you've ever been on, and I'll be the best boyfriend ever, and—"
"Jun, stop right there." Her voice wasn't quite as harsh as Jun was used to. She sounded more fatigued than furious, and she looked like she could use some coffee. Later, he would find out that they'd been fighting a new enemy—Team Plasma—that was threatening to "liberate" the Pokémon of the Unova region, and that was the chief reason she looked tired. "It's a nice offer, but I still don't want to go out with you."
"Why not?" he asked.
"You really don't unders…?" Mitsumi shook her head. "You come on way too strong. You can't just make someone return your feelings by repeatedly shoving them in her face. If anything, it makes me less likely to want to go out with you. All the times you throw yourself at me… sometimes literally… and all of the claims that you love me—"
"But I do love you," said Jun.
"You're infatuated with me. There's a difference."
Hareta chimed in. Jun had almost forgotten that he was there. "I thought that infatuation wore off after you withdrew the Pokémon from battle." He was twirling the Bolt Badge around in his fingers, and Jun wasn't so sure that his rival wasn't contemplating whether it might be slightly tasty.
Infatuated? thought Jun. "Infatuated" was such a superficial word. And Jun's feelings were not superficial. Maybe they had started out that way—after all, Mitsumi was a very attractive young woman, and it was impossible not to immediately notice that before anything else—but there were plenty of beautiful women in the world. And surely some of those women would actually be willing to go out with him. So it wasn't just that. Mitsumi was smart and cared about Pokémon, and she was braver than almost anyone else that Jun had ever met. She could be temperamental, but ultimately, she was a kind person. Plus, she hadn't murdered Hareta for his outrageous antics yet, which had to be worth something. "You're beautiful" was just shorthand for "you're a great person, and I admire you a lot."
Jun shrugged and held out the picnic basket, battling back a sigh. "Well, in any case, we can't let all this food go to waste. How about we just have a picnic?"
Mitsumi raised an eyebrow.
"The three of us, I mean. A purely platonic picnic. A platonic-nic."
"And then," said Hareta, "We can have another battle! I caught a cool Jellicent that I want you to meet!"
"Sure," Jun said, "A battle." He wasn't quite as enthusiastic as Hareta—and not just because it was impossible for anyone to have as much raw enthusiasm as the wild boy. By this point, Jun had noticed another pattern that was just as discouraging as Mitsumi always turning him down: Hareta never failed to beat him when they battled.
During their picnic, Hareta and Mitsumi told him about Team Plasma. The more Jun heard of those thugs, the less he liked them. Their king, N, sounded like he had genuinely noble intentions, but many of the others… They sounded like petty Pokémon thieves standing under a banner of good excuses. Jun resolved to keep growing stronger, so he and his friends could put a stop to them. There were some Trainers in the world who were cruel to their Pokémon and didn't deserve to have them, but liberating all Pokémon—including the ones who loved and were loved by their Trainers—wasn't the right way.
Hareta and Mitsumi also told Jun the story that they had heard about twin heroes and a great dragon Pokémon—who later became Reshiram and Zekrom—creating the region of Unova, and how such a Pokémon and a hero would return to guide the world in the right direction.
"What if I could be that hero?" Hareta exclaimed, with half of a sandwich crammed in his mouth. "I could meet that dragon Pokémon and stop Team Plasma from taking people's Pokémon away!"
"That would be impressive," said Mitsumi.
After dinner, Hareta and Jun had their battle. Both teams had grown stronger since their last encounter, and they both fought with all of their strength. But Hareta's Pokémon were a little stronger—of course. And in the end, the win was theirs—of course.
It was almost worse than being curb-stomped. Being so close to victory, seeing it only inches from your grasp… and then watching as it was snatched away again. No matter how far Jun came, it was impossible to catch up to Hareta.
A seed of an idea started to blossom in his mind that night. What if he could become that hero in the legend? What if he revived that great dragon Pokémon and stopped Team Plasma? Mitsumi did say that such a feat would be impressive. And with such a powerful Pokémon on Jun's side, surely he could beat Hareta in a battle.
I'll be the hero! Just you wait.
For the record, Mitsumi wasn't oblivious. She had noticed how Jun's losses to Hareta shook the blond Trainer's confidence, and she suspected that he wasn't wholly on board with Hareta's idea to awaken Zekrom and fill the role of the hero in the legend.
"Doesn't it bother you?" Jun asked her once. Hareta wasn't paying attention to their conversation, which wasn't exactly unusual. He was engrossed in a game he was playing with his Pokémon.
"What?" she asked.
"That he wants to be the hero," said Jun. "Don't you ever think that you would be better for the job?"
"Me?" she repeated. "No. A hundred times no. I don't want to be the hero."
Mitsumi was confident in her abilities as a Trainer, but she rarely felt the need to prove them to everyone else. She didn't challenge every gym that they encountered like Hareta did. She was talented at Pokémon battles (that was an understatement), but she preferred showcasing their abilities in ways that didn't involve combat. Contests brought out the beauty of her companions in a way that battling rarely did. She had learned to master Contests on her own, and her memories of those were more positive than her memories of battles long buried in the past. It wasn't that Mitsumi feared her own power, not any longer. She had many fond memories of battling in recent years, and she had worked to move past most of her bitterness regarding Team Galactic—she saw Cyrus occasionally, and she had forgiven him, even if she would never be able to forget—but she still had other memories of Pokémon battles that harbored a darker tinge.
She was still remembered as Team Galactic's fighting machine by some back in Sinnoh, and while some people might welcome a chance to gain a new reputation as "the hero," Mitsumi didn't desire it. She knew how far she had come, and that was enough for her.
The thought of having such a title, and the ideals that it stood for, called to both Hareta and Jun, though. They shared some of the same reasons, but some of them were different. Mitsumi doubted that Hareta knew or cared much about what people thought of him; he'd made that clear on many occasions. He understood Pokémon much better than other humans.
But she suspected that part of Jun's motivation was that he wanted to accomplish something that Hareta couldn't—because even though they were friends, they were still rivals, and because Hareta was always darting ahead of him. Jun had to resent that. It had to be a blow to his confidence, and not the first, either. His loss to Jupiter at Lake Acuity, and to Koya at the Pokémon League, and now, Hareta defeating him over and over again.
Mitsumi no longer agreed with everything that Cyrus had taught her when she was a child, but she remembered what he had told her about rationality trumping emotions. When feelings got out of hand, they led people into trouble.
She resolved to keep a close eye on Jun, to make sure that he didn't do anything reckless. But of course, whenever Hareta or Jun was involved, recklessness was par for the course.
"Jun, what are you doing?"
Jun sat on his Dragonite's back, ready to take off. On the ground, Mitsumi frowned up at him, gesturing to the Dark Stone clutched in his hands.
"Lenora gave that to us so we could give it to Hareta," she reminded him. "So he can revive Zekrom and stop N."
"Hareta just skipped off to get a sandwich," Jun pointed out. "Do you really believe that he's going to take this seriously?"
The dark circles beneath Mitsumi's eyes were more pronounced than they had been, and Jun was sure that he didn't look well-rested, either. The struggle against Team Plasma consumed everything else, and suddenly, sleep didn't seem like such a huge priority. The only person who didn't look like he was about to keel over from exhaustion these days was Hareta, who seemed to be energized by the prospect of life or death situations.
"I… I'm not sure," said Mitsumi. "But whether Hareta takes things seriously or not, he always manages to come through. It's always been that way, and this won't be any different." She set her hands on her hips. "You're not going anywhere."
Jun didn't let go of the Dark Stone, and he didn't dismount from Dragonite's back. "But who says Hareta's really the hero? Why is it always him? I can reawaken Zekrom and take on N and Reshiram!"
She didn't speak. She bit her lip, with an expression on her face that was torn so many different ways that Jun couldn't pinpoint them all. He did pick up on traces of dread, frustration, and worse—doubt.
"Don't… Don't you think I can do it, Mitsumi?"
She was silent. He hadn't truly expected her to suddenly start professing her belief in him. He tried to look confident, sitting straight and tall on Dragonite's back, but he wasn't sure if he could accomplish it or not. Jun was a self-assured person by nature, but he understood what a serious undertaking this was. Reviving the legendary Zekrom and fighting the king of Team Plasma, who had earned the loyalty of another legendary Pokémon who was equally matched… Jun was strong, but Hareta had always been a little bit stronger. Maybe his rival really was better equipped for the task, and maybe he knew it. But all the same…
"I want to save Unova and make sure that people and Pokémon stay together. I can be the hero!"
"They entrusted the stone to Hareta because they believe that he's the hero," Mitsumi said, glancing back in the direction where Hareta had disappeared minutes before. "He's the only person who can communicate with Pokémon the way that N can. They're equals in that regard. Hareta can make him see sense and stop all of this."
A faint breeze ruffled her hair. Jun still didn't move, to dismount or to order his Pokémon to take flight.
"He's your friend, too, Jun. Don't you have faith in him?" Mitsumi asked.
"Of course I do. Everyone has absolute faith in Hareta. He always manages to be two skips ahead of everybody else, without even trying."
She frowned, obviously picking up on something in his voice. "This isn't about who's the better Trainer. It's about who is best suited for this task. Hareta and his ideals and his bond with Pokémon make him the perfect choice."
Jun sighed. "Look, I know that. But it would be nice to be the one to save the world, wouldn't it? We realize what a big deal this is, but in the end, Hareta will treat it like a game and still come out on top."
Mitsumi held out a hand. Resigned, Jun slid down from Dragonite's back and handed over the Dark Stone. She tucked it securely inside her bag. Then, there was a silence so heavy that Jun felt like something was constricting his lungs, like Mitsumi's Milotic had used Wrap on his torso.
"You know, you don't have to be the hero to be heroic," Mitsumi finally said. Her voice was softer than he was accustomed to. She didn't look him in the eyes as she spoke, instead choosing to keep glancing around the area for the return of their traveling companion. "Hareta and I would have had a much more difficult time getting to this point without your help. Remember all of those Team Plasma members that you and your Pokémon took on just yesterday?"
Jun's face felt hot. And he wasn't the type who blushed at the drop of a hat or a tiny compliment. "I didn't think you noticed."
She ignored this comment. "You're a strong Trainer, Jun. That means something, even if you're not the hero of legend."
She looked at him then, right in the eyes, and she smiled. It wasn't Mitsumi's typical, strained "go away, Jun, before I knock you senseless" smile, and although it wasn't quite on par with the expression of pure adoration she wore when she looked at her Pokémon, it was still a nice smile. A genuinely friendly smile. All in all, it was a pleasant moment.
It might have stayed that way, except Jun couldn't stay quiet. "Does that mean I'm your hero, then?"
Mitsumi socked him in the arm in reply. "Idiot."
Hareta returned with a sandwich in tow—it turned out that he had dropped by the Pokémon Center after grabbing lunch—and Mitsumi presented him with the Dark Stone. He took it, stared at it in wonder, and for a second, Jun could have sworn that he was considering popping it in his mouth.
But Hareta just smiled—not a wide, manic grin, but a small smile of determination. "So I guess we're going to tell Zekrom to wake up so we can take on N! Ready?"
"We're ready."
Even so, the tension crescendoed the closer they came to their destination. Jun clung to Dragonite's neck, while Mitsumi and Hareta sat behind him. Jun was conscious of how tightly Mitsumi held onto him. She didn't seem to realize that she was doing it, so she had to be nervous about what lay ahead. Even Hareta was quiet for once. It was seriously eerie.
"You know," Jun said to shatter the silence, looking back over his shoulder, "This is going to be really dangerous. If we make it back, Mitsumi—"
"I'm still not going to date you," she said.
He sighed rather dramatically. "Oh, no, however shall I go on?"
"The same way you always do." There was little acid in her voice, in spite of her words. "Now, shut up. We're almost there."
"After all of that, do you think you're still worthy of sharing the name Harmonia with me? You good-for-nothing boy!"
Mitsumi's pulse hammered in her ears, so loud that she could hardly hear the words that Ghetsis continued to sling at N. Her fists were so tight at her sides that she could barely feel them at all. The young, green-haired Trainer stood beside the unconscious form of his Reshiram and stared at Ghetsis, not speaking. Ghetsis had barged into the room only moments after Hareta and Zekrom had defeated N in a nerve-wracking, dangerously close battle. Ever since then, Mitsumi hadn't been able to shake the urge to wrap her hands around the Sage's throat.
Only a few things stopped her. Hareta's victorious smile as he had congratulated the exhausted Zekrom moments before, after they had triumphed because of ideals and love, not bitterness. And Jun's hand on her arm, not intruding but impeding. "Easy there, Mitsumi."
And the third thing—her legs were cemented to the floor. She felt cold and strangely small inside this vast room in N's massive castle.
"After saying you had to put your beliefs on the line and battle to see which one chosen by the legendary Pokémon was the true hero… You lost to an ordinary Trainer!" Ghetsis continued. "There is such a thing as being too stupid! Add it up, and you are nothing more than a warped, defective boy who knows nothing but Pokémon."
Something in Mitsumi's head snapped. One second, she couldn't move, could only watch. The next second, she was on the other side of the room. The walls echoed with the sound of her voice saying a few words she had never uttered in front of the impressionable Hareta before. And Mitsumi's fist was throbbing from the force she'd used as it rocketed into Ghetsis's face.
But it was worth it to watch the man stagger back, a trickle of blood seeping from his nose. "How dare you?"
"How dare you?" The words exploded from Mitsumi's mouth. She didn't feel cold anymore. Fire blazed at the edges of her vision. "Saying things like that to your own son! What's wrong with you?"
Ghetsis was silent for a moment, expressionless. Then, a smirk spread across his face. Mitsumi took a step back, shuddering despite herself. "Stupid girl. Are you trying to challenge me?"
"That wasn't my intention. My intention was to knock some sense into your thick skull." She slipped a hand into her bag, her fingers fumbling for her loyal Infernape's Pokéball. She steeled her voice and her nerve. "But if you want a battle, I won't back down."
"Mitsumi, wait!"
She glanced back. Hareta and N were tending to their Pokémon's injuries, and even Hareta wasn't grinning now. Jun had rushed up behind her, a Pokéball already in his hand. His features were grave, and he looked older than usual somehow.
"I can fight him, Mitsumi."
Ghetsis's eerie, red-eyed gaze oscillated between them, sizing both Trainers up. "Who are the two of you supposed to be, anyway? That child's sidekicks? You weren't chosen by Zekrom or Reshiram."
"So what?" said Mitsumi. "Neither were you."
"A Pokémon, even if it's revered as a deity, is still just a Pokémon. Even if I wasn't chosen, I'm still the greatest threat you could ever face." He was still smiling coldly. "What makes you think that you can go head to head with me?"
"Well, she did just deck you in the face," Jun muttered.
Ghetsis stood taller than Jun, and on top of that, he exerted an aura of severity and superiority that made him seem even loftier than that. "Really, who do you think you are?"
"I'm Mitsumi's hero." Jun turned to face her, cutting off any protests that she might have made. His gaze was earnest. "Let me fight him. I swear, I can take him!"
On one hand, she didn't want to discourage him, after she had already barred him from trying to awaken Zekrom himself. On the other, she could fight her own battles. This Ghetsis was a dangerous man, and she didn't want Jun's Pokémon to get hurt. Even if his team showed promise, he hadn't been battling for as long as she had.
"Well… We can have a Double Battle," Mitsumi decided. She matched Ghetsis's gaze with all of its intensity. "Six of your Pokémon, and six of ours."
"Very well." Ghetsis sneered. "I can't wait to see the look on your face when you've lost all hope! Go, Cofagrigus and Seismitoad!"
Mitsumi and Jun called out Dusknoir and Torterra, and the battle began.
It went much more smoothly than Mitsumi had honestly expected. Not the conflict against Ghetsis—whose Pokémon were well-trained and alarmingly powerful—but the teamwork component. Her Pokémon and Jun's worked well together. Their moves complemented each other, not flawlessly, but quite well all the same. Even though Jun was down to his third Pokémon by the time the battle ended, and Mitsumi's second, Glaceon, was one small hit away from fainting… Ghetsis's last Pokémon, Hydreigon, hit the ground, unable to continue.
We won. For a fragile, breathless moment, she stared at Jun, and he grinned back, his brown eyes glimmering. It took Mitsumi a second to realize that she was also smiling. And another to realize who she was smiling at, and that they were close in a very literal sense, their arms practically brushing. A third second passed, and she wondered if, in the afterglow of the battle, she even minded.
Then, Ghetsis's voice, booming off the towering walls, snapped her back to reality. He was talking about Team Plasma and N again. At least he'd been too preoccupied during their battle to open his mouth too often.
"…Since I couldn't become the hero and obtain the legendary Pokémon myself… I prepared someone for that purpose—N!" Ghetsis's gaze cut over to N, standing motionless beside a barely conscious Reshiram, and Hareta nearby, trying to reason with him. "He's nothing more than a freak without a human heart. Do you think you're going to get through to a warped person like that?"
Mitsumi still hadn't recalled her Glaceon. She put a hand on top of her Pokémon's cold head—trying to ignore the way her fingers were suddenly trembling, and not from Glaceon's chill—and glared at Ghetsis. "What is your problem? How could you manipulate your own child that way? Don't you even care?"
For once, Ghetsis didn't speak. Not out of any sudden onslaught of remorse, but because he didn't have to. The cruel expression on his face spoke volumes above any words the orator could have uttered.
There was a roaring sound in Mitsumi's ears that didn't have any correlation to the outside world. "You're the only one here without a heart! Glaceon—"
"Hareta, Mitsumi, Jun, there you are!" Champion Alder burst into the room, and Mitsumi's order died somewhere between her brain and her tongue. Part of her was grateful for that. She'd been so close to doing something that she might regret… or worse, that she might not.
Alder said a few words to N, and then, he took Ghetsis—still silent—away. It was only once Ghetsis was gone that Mitsumi unleashed a breath she hadn't known she was holding captive in her lungs. She called her Glaceon back into its Pokéball. Then, she turned to where N and Hareta stood with their Pokémon.
N was talking quietly to the boy now. Mitsumi could only make out a few snatches of words. "Hareta, I want to talk to you about something. It's about when I first met you in Accumula Town…. I couldn't understand it. I couldn't believe there were Pokémon that liked people. Because, up until that moment, I'd never known a Pokémon like that…. That was why I needed to confirm my beliefs by battling with you. I wanted to confront you hero to hero. I needed that more than anything."
Mitsumi turned away. Her hands were still shaking, and she couldn't make them stop. Not even when she clenched them into fists. She kept thinking about Ghetsis, the awful things that he'd said and done, the complete absence of guilt…. She didn't know why it shook her so deeply. Except maybe she did.
She wasn't aware of the hot tear trickling down her cheek until a hand brushed it away. Jun retreated quickly as she looked up, probably wary that she was going to lash out him. "Mitsumi?"
"I'm fine," she said.
"Are you sure?"
She paused, drawing in a deep breath. "I'm sure."
The sound of Hareta's voice seized Mitsumi's attention. "N, wait! You can't go. Come with us!"
N looked down at him and smiled. "Hareta, your offer is a kind one. Thank you," he said slowly. "But what I should do now is something I'll have to decide for myself. Dream your dream! Then, pursue the ideals to make that dream a reality, and someday you will achieve all that you dreamed of! Well then… Farewell! All of you."
He leapt nimbly onto Reshiram's back, nodded to each of them in turn, and took off. It was a majestic scene—the white dragon Pokémon and his hero soaring high into the clouds and vanishing from sight. Going off into the unknown to transform into something new, away from the influence of Ghetsis and his team. Mitsumi could respect that.
She didn't notice that Hareta was already bounding toward the exit until Jun's hand brushed against her arm. "Mitsumi? I think we're leaving now," he said quietly.
"Right." She cast one last look up at the clouds, then turned and followed them.
In the wake of the events at N's Castle, things finally slowed down. For the first time in ages, Jun actually got a solid nine hours of sleep. He and Hareta tackled the Elite Four (actually, Hareta literally tackled Grimsley once) and won, and Hareta defeated "Uncle Alder" in a magnificent battle that was a challenge even for him.
Jun waited for Alder to return from healing his Pokémon. He wanted to battle against him next. Alder was an exceptional Trainer, to present such a challenge to Hareta—but of course he was exceptional; he'd been Unova's Champion, after all—but all the same, Jun was itching to challenge him. The events in N's Castle had made his Pokémon strong, and they wanted to test their strength as much as he did.
Jun sat down beside Mitsumi in the stands while he waited for Alder to come back. She and Hareta were going to watch the battle, although whether that was encouraging or made Jun feel the pressure even more was still up for debate.
"Nervous?" Mitsumi asked. "That's not like you."
"I'm not nervous. I just wish he'd hurry back so we can get started." Jun leaned back against the row of bleachers behind him, folding his arms behind his head. "So where are you two headed after this is over?"
"I think we need to stay around long enough to ensure that Team Plasma disbands. And we need to track down Ghetsis. Did you hear that creep escaped? A man like that is too dangerous to let him keep running around."
She gritted her teeth and went silent for a minute. Jun remembered how livid she'd been when she faced Ghetsis, how she'd been on the verge of giving Glaceon an order, an order to attack the man directly, when Alder had come in and interrupted her. She'd scared Jun for a minute. He thought that she had frightened herself a little, too. He put a hand on her shoulder—not in a flirty way, but in the way that one would support a friend—until her jaw had unclenched and her breathing had calmed.
"But after that," Mitsumi said, "We're off to a new region that I keep hearing about: Kalos. Hareta's very excited."
"Poor Kalos," said Jun. "It won't know what hit it."
She smiled faintly. "Have you heard of Kalos before?" she asked.
"I've heard it mentioned once or twice, but of course I've never been."
"Well, I hear it's nice this time of year. Are you going to come with us?"
The question surprised Jun. When Hareta had invited him along to Unova, Mitsumi had seemed reluctant at best. He flashed back to their Double Battle with Ghetsis, the way they and their Pokémon had battled side by side so perfectly. And her smile afterward. Maybe she didn't return his feelings—and by this point, Jun had learned better than to assume that she did, though he could still try to change that—but she thought of him as more than a nuisance now. More like a friend. The thought made his chest feel warm, and less tense even in spite of his anticipation of his battle with Alder.
"You know I wouldn't miss it," he said.
He paused, his gaze sweeping around the vast room. Alder still hadn't returned. And Hareta had wandered off somewhere. They should probably look for him, because when left alone for too long, Hareta had a bad habit of wreaking havoc. But then, Jun had a sudden burst of genius that kept him from leaving.
"Mitsumi?"
She looked over curiously. The circles were fading from underneath her eyes, and she looked happier now. Even if they hadn't managed to save the bond between people and Pokémon in the process, this alone would have made the events at N's Castle worth it. "Yeah?"
"You up for a wager?"
It wasn't exactly a secret that Mitsumi liked to gamble on occasion, so this question sparked her interest. Of course, it was still Mitsumi that he was dealing with, so she wasn't going to just agree automatically. "It depends on the wager. It had better not be anything weird."
Jun wasn't sure what she classified as "weird." Her perception was probably a little skewed after traveling with Hareta for so long. For that matter, except when it came to Pokémon types, Jun was no longer sure what the word "normal" meant.
"How about this? If I manage to defeat Alder in this battle, you'll go out to dinner with me."
She didn't deck him in the face immediately, which he took as a good sign. "What happens if you lose?"
Jun hadn't thought that far ahead. "Then… Then if you want me to stop asking, I'll stop."
"You actually mean that?" Mitsumi said, wide-eyed.
"Of course. A gentleman doesn't break his word."
He thought he heard her mutter something sarcastic under her breath, something about having no idea that Jun was a gentleman, but he decided to ignore it. He would keep his word. If he lost the battle with Alder, he'd stop asking Mitsumi on dates if she wanted him to.
Except Jun wasn't going to lose.
"Fine," Mitsumi said at last. "I'll take that bet." She held out her hand, and they shook on it. And maybe Jun tried to hold on for a second too long, but only a second. It wasn't like this was his last opportunity to hold Mitsumi's hand, because there was no way that he was going to lose this battle.
It was then that Alder and Hareta returned. Their clothes looked a little charred, and Alder was towing the beaming wild boy after him by the sleeve.
"What happened?" Mitsumi exclaimed. She cut Hareta off before he could answer. "Never mind. The more I think about it, the less I want to know."
"A wise decision," said Alder. He turned to Jun. "Are you ready for our battle?"
Jun stood up from his seat. "Definitely!" He grinned back at Hareta and Mitsumi, shooting the latter a broad wink. "Wish me luck!"
"Good luck, Jun!" Hareta answered, sitting down beside Mitsumi. He gave his rival a thumbs-up, and then Jun turned around to face Alder.
It was the closest battle of Jun's life—even closer than his latest battle with Hareta. Alder was down to his last Pokémon, Volcarona. Jun only had Torterra left, so he knew he was at a disadvantage, but his Simipour had managed to weaken Volcarona a lot before it fainted. A couple of solid hits, and Torterra could bring it down.
And Jun had his friends rooting for him. Hareta kept yelling compliments about the Pokémon's attacks, and even Mitsumi was cheering him on. Jun figured she'd temporarily forgotten about the wager, if she was willing to do that. Beside her, Eevee was bouncing up and down with excitement. And Hareta had gotten his Empoleon to do some kind of weird cheer in the stands. It was more distracting than inspiring, but it was a nice gesture in theory.
"Volcarona," Alder called, "Bug Buzz!"
Jun gritted his teeth against the earsplitting sound emitted by Alder's Pokémon. Torterra staggered back and cringed.
"Hang in there, Torterra! Use Crunch!"
Torterra clamped its jaws around Volcarona. Alder's Pokémon managed to pull itself free, but it had obviously been weakened by the attacks of Simipour and Torterra. They were inches from victory. Just one more good hit, Torterra. Just one more, and we'll beat him! Jun's friends were still cheering him on, and in that second, he was unstoppable.
Then Adler issued his next command. "Volcarona, use Overheat!"
There was a burst of vivid flame, so violent that Jun had to shield his face. His gaze landed on his friends in the stands. They looked stunned. Eevee had stopped bouncing. Even Hareta was silent.
Torterra collapsed on the ground at Jun's feet, charred and unconscious. It was over.
"That was an exhilarating battle. Your Pokémon are very talented," said Alder, but Jun hardly heard him.
They had been so close. Close enough that they could already feel victory in their grasp, sweet enough to taste. They were always so close. But they had still lost.
"That really was an awesome battle, Jun," Hareta chirped as they started toward the Pokémon Center. "Are you gonna challenge him again?"
"Of course," said Jun. "We're going to train a little more, and then we're going straight back for another battle. We just need to get a little stronger, and then we'll have the edge."
"There are always a lot of Trainers looking for battles on Victory Road," Mitsumi suggested. And then, when he didn't answer—lost in thoughts of how he'd lost—she added, "It really was a close battle. We thought you were going to win." She didn't acknowledge the wager, which was a tiny blessing, he guessed.
"Yeah… So did I."
He defeated Alder on his next attempt, a few days later. No wagers, no weird Empoleon cheers, just a battle between two Trainers who wanted their Pokémon to reach their full potential. It was another close fight—so close that Jun found that his shoulders were painfully tense once the battle had concluded—but this time, the dust settled, and Jun's Pokémon was the one left standing. He'd caught up to Alder… and sprinted just a little bit ahead.
When they received their Kalos starter Pokémon from Professor Sycamore, Hareta immediately challenged Jun to a Pokémon battle. "That's the best way for me to get to know Fennekin better! And you and Froakie can get to know each other that way, too!"
"You're on!" said Jun.
Mitsumi was content to watch the boys battle with their new Pokémon with Chespin by her side. Watching two friends battle was always complicated. On one hand, no matter what happened, one of your friends won. On the other hand, one of them always had to lose.
But not always the same friend. "Froakie," said Jun, "Use Bubble one more time!"
The frog Pokémon complied, attacking Fennekin with a stream of bubbles. Fennekin collapsed in a faint. That was new. Hareta scooped his Pokémon up from the floor and cradled it until it regained consciousness.
"Wow, Jun. That was a lot of fun!" he said, undeterred by his loss. "We should battle again soon! After our Pokémon have taken a break, I mean."
"Of course," said Jun. Beaming, he turned to their traveling companion. "Mitsumi, did you see that?"
She fought back a grin. "See what? I was staring off into space."
Jun's smile slipped momentarily. "What? Really?"
"No, idiot, I was watching," she said. She shot him a thumbs-up. "Good job, Jun."
He returned the gesture proudly. "Thanks!"
"Hey, guys?" Hareta said. "Let's get going! If we hurry, I bet we can get to Camphrier Town before it gets dark!" Without waiting for an answer, he bolted out the door.
"Hareta? Hareta, wait up!"
"We're so close to taking those creeps down. After that, I'm going to sleep for a week."
"Just a week, Mitsumi? When this blows over, I'm going to sleep for a year."
Jun swore, they couldn't travel anywhere without running headlong into some kind of huge, region-wide conspiracy. Last year, it had been Team Galactic. Three months ago, Team Plasma. And now, it was Team Flare, with their "fashionable" (read: garish) suits and plans to make the world "more beautiful" (read: for them). Maybe Mitsumi thought that Jun was joking about his desire to sleep for a year, but he really, really wasn't.
They sat on a bench in the vast, glittering Lumiose City, with Eevee perched between them. The tiny Pokémon's tail was wagging, and it leaned over and nuzzled Jun's arm. He grinned and stroked the soft fur behind its ears. Hareta wandered around nearby, as tireless as ever. He was currently playing with a Skiddo that he'd spotted sleeping on the sidewalk. The two had become instant friends, because that was just the way things worked between Hareta and Pokémon. He had an incredible gift for that—even if it was balanced out by his knack for causing some sort of damage to people or property everywhere they went.
Mitsumi sighed into her hands. "I get tired just watching him. Does he ever sleep?"
"He didn't sleep much last night. Remember, I had to share a room with him," said Jun. "He and Fennekin kept jumping on his bed, and they even got my Froakie to join in. I'm pretty sure Hareta made a dent in the ceiling."
"I'm not even surprised anymore," said Mitsumi. "Is that a bad thing? It's started to seem almost normal."
"Hareta being Hareta, crazy guys in weird clothes trying to take over the world or whatever… What's not normal here?"
She smiled. Even when she was half-asleep and frazzled, Mitsumi was still beautiful enough to put the dazzling lights of Lumiose to shame. She had purchased a new dress and cap here in the city, and they complimented her eyes quite nicely. Jun was still allowed to notice that she looked nice, wasn't he? Even if he wasn't allowed to ask her out? Which he hadn't done since the day he'd lost to Alder. Jun had many talents, and keeping his word was one of them. He'd said that he wouldn't ask Mitsumi out again, so he wouldn't, no matter how difficult it was. And he'd promised that they would take down Team Flare. So he would get on that, too.
He sat up straighter against the bench. "So we need to stock up on Potions, then figure out where Team Galac… Plasm… Flare's base is located. We bust in with all guns blazing—well, with Pokémon moves blazing—you know what I mean, Mitsumi. And we put a stop to them." He wasn't smiling. Pokémon and people were at risk—it wasn't exactly a smiling matter.
Mitsumi watched him curiously, not speaking for a moment. "You've grown up."
"Well," he said, a grin slipping onto his face, "I am a fair bit taller than you now."
"You know what I mean. You're taking all of this seriously."
"I've been taking this seriously, Mitsumi. Where have you been?"
"No idea," she said. She was watching Hareta now as he skipped along beside the Skiddo. "I guess there's some tiny margin of hope for Hareta after all, then."
"Maybe," Jun said. "I mean, I haven't seen him stuff any badges in his mouth since we came to Kalos."
She smiled again. "I bet it happens by the time we reach the Pokémon League."
"Come on, Mitsumi, I'm not going to bet against you on that."
"Skiddo, wait up!" Hareta crowed as he sprinted past their bench in pursuit of the Pokémon. It was even faster than he was. He laughed loudly as he chased it. Eevee leaped off the bench and took off in pursuit.
"I have no idea how he does it," said Mitsumi, shaking her head. "I wouldn't have that much energy if I drank a whole pot of coffee." She rose from the bench, smoothing down her skirt. "But it's worth a shot—maybe two or three shots. Espresso. I'm going to grab some. Wasn't there a café down the street? This town is so big. I feel like I'm always lost."
"There's about fifty cafes around here. Just walk in a direction, and you'll run into one within a few minutes. Oh, but would you mind bringing me back a coffee? Here, I'll give you the money." He reached into his bag.
"I didn't mean that I was going by myself," Mitsumi said. "Team Flare's base is who knows where. It's not the most brilliant idea to go walking around alone, somewhat lost, and half dead from exhaustion when we've already put ourselves at the top of their hit list. Not even with my team."
"Oh," he said. "Okay. I'll go and chase down Hareta, then."
She glanced back at the boy and the Skiddo and rolled her eyes. "He moves too fast for us or Team Flare to catch. He wouldn't even notice if we ditched him."
"Yeah, he probably wouldn—" Jun broke off mid-laugh. "Wait, we? What?"
"Don't look at me like that." Mitsumi made a point of not returning his gaze. Her cheeks were slightly pink, though it might have been a mild sunburn from their time running around in pursuit of Team Flare. Her eyes were still fixed pointedly on Hareta, now halfway down the street. He'd caught up to the Skiddo, which was now headbutting him gently in the stomach. Eevee pranced around them. "We're just a couple of tired people going to grab coffee."
"A couple of tired people…?" Jun started.
"No. If you make some huge deal out of this, I'm going by myself." Mitsumi started off down the street.
"Mitsumi, wait!" He dashed to catch up to her. "I won't make a big deal out of it, I promise! Even if you did just ask me out on a date."
"It is not a date," she said, increasing her pace. "It's coffee. I want coffee, you want coffee, so we're going to drink some coffee."
"By ourselves. Together."
"Go back and wait with Hareta."
Jun sighed. "All right, I'll do my best not to say anything to indicate that I'm in love with you."
"Jun, this is really your last chance this time," she said.
"I'm well aware of that. I mean, I doubt you'd work up the nerve to ask me out a second time if this goes badly. And I'm not allowed to ask you out if you don't want me to." He grinned. "Unless you do want me to…"
She punched him in the arm—although it lacked her typical force. Probably because she was so tired. "One more comment like that, and I'll fine you ten million dollars."
"Hey, that's my line!" Seeing the glare on her face, Jun grinned, holding his hands up defensively in front of his face. "Fine, fine, I'll be good."
The coffee shop was cozy. They sat at a small table near the window and talked. Not about romance or Team Flare or even Hareta. Just… whatever came to mind. And Mitsumi was smiling again. She still looked tired, but she was smiling at him, and it was an effort for Jun to bite back some dramatic declaration of his feelings, but he managed. Even if Mitsumi wasn't ready to admit that it was a date, it was still nice.
Well, it was nice for about ten minutes. Then, Hareta came darting by the window, not grinning anymore, being pursued by several scientists. Also, his cap was on fire for some reason.
Mitsumi cursed under her breath, pushing her chair back and standing up from the table. "Of course. Of course. What is he even doing?"
Jun called out his Froakie. "Go use Water Pulse on the idiot's head before he kills himself." He grinned at Mitsumi. "You can go ahead and sort out whatever he's gotten himself into. I'll stay here and pay."
"Thanks. I will pay you back for mine later, though." She started out the door, then turned back. "Sorry about this."
"About Hareta being Hareta? That's normal. I expected him to do something like this. And at least we're wide awake now," said Jun. "But I had a good time—even if it was a tragically short good time."
Mitsumi opened her mouth to speak, but nothing came out. The sound of piercing sirens outside distracted her. She groaned, slapping a palm to her forehead. "I'd better deal with that." And she was gone.
After that mess was handled—Jun still couldn't grasp what had happened, only that it had involved Hareta finding his way into a lab, accidentally tampering with some expensive equipment, and setting himself on fire before leaping out a second-story window—they took a minute to catch their breath before they returned to their pursuit of Team Flare. This took them back to the same bench they had occupied earlier that morning.
Hareta sat on the edge of the bench on Mitsumi's left, twirling his case of badges in his hands. Jun turned to Mitsumi and shrugged apologetically. "And to think—we were this close to having a nice, normal date."
"Coffee," Mitsumi amended.
"Fine. A nice, normal coffee. Maybe next time, we'll be luckier."
"Next time?" she said. "Who says there's going to be a next—Hareta! Get that out of your mouth!"
Hareta lowered the case from his mouth. "What? I'm hungry! You guys didn't get me anything."
"Good thing I didn't take that bet against you, Mitsumi," Jun murmured.
Mitsumi stood up from the bench. "I'll get you a sandwich, Hareta. You can't fight Team Flare on an empty stomach. Be right back." To Jun, as he followed her, she added, "If I left it up to him, he'd forget to pay."
"Again," Jun said.
"Again," she echoed. "Next time we want coffee, we should just wait until he's challenging a gym or something. A battle is one thing that's sure to hold his attention for more than ten seconds."
"He's like a Murkrow, distracted so easily by anything shiny…." He trailed off. "You said 'next time?'"
"Hypothetically. If I were ever stupid enough to agree to a next time—which I won't be."
"You said 'next time!' I heard you!" Jun's steps were brisk. Today was shaping up to be an excellent day.
"Jun? Mitsumi?" Hareta's voice sounded behind them. "Wait up!"
"He's asking us to wait?" said Jun. "That's new."
Mitsumi barely fought back a smile as Hareta bolted up beside them. "New can be a good thing." She caught the expression on Jun's face and backtracked. "I-in Hareta's case."
"What's wrong with my case?" the boy asked. He pulled out his badge case again and stared at it curiously as they walked.
Mitsumi responded with a preemptive, "Don't put it in your mouth."
Hareta grinned. "I know that, Mitsumi. I did that less than a minute ago! And it didn't taste good. So when are we gonna battle Team Flare?"
"As soon as we figure out where their headquarters is located," said Mitsumi.
A shock of color flashed in Jun's peripheral vision. He turned and saw two men in the distinctive garb of Team Flare. He put a hand on each of his companions' shoulders to hold them back, and they watched silently as the Team Flare grunts disappeared into a café down the street. He kept his hand on Mitsumi's shoulder for an extra second or two after they had vanished from sight. Just to see how she would react. The look on her face did not disappoint.
"I feel like we're close," he said, gesturing to the café up ahead. "Very, very close."
The first five times, Jun asked Mitsumi out and was turned down flat. (Well, the fifth time, he technically lost a bet, but the point still stood—his efforts did not end with him dating the girl of his dreams.)
The sixth time, she asked him if he wanted to get coffee, and it probably would have been a very nice date, if not for a certain interruption who went by the name of Hareta.
The seventh time—after the smoke in the wake of Team Flare had cleared, and the world was lulled into a (surely temporary) state of peace—they got coffee again and watched the sunrise, while Hareta went to challenge the next Gym Leader the moment that the gym doors opened.
By the ninth time, it had become a new habit. And sometimes, new was a very good thing.
The fifteenth time, Mitsumi stopped protesting every time Jun referred to their outings as dates. Or at least, she stopped protesting quite so vehemently.
After the twenty-sixth time, he overheard Hareta asking Mitsumi if Jun was her boyfriend now. And she thought about it, shrugged her shoulders, and said, "I don't know. I mean… maybe. Shut up and play with your badges." Which was close, inches away even, from a yes.
Author's Note: Honestly, I don't know how many people even remember DPA anymore, so perhaps nobody will even read this (much less review it). But you know, that's surprisingly all right with me, because I had a lot of fun (and renewed DPA feelings) writing it. Like I said, the idea just kind of sprang into my mind, half-formed, and it just sat around and demanded to be written until it finally poured out into a Word document, and voila.
I hope somebody out there likes it. Congratulations to you (yes, you) for making it to the end. It turned out far, far longer than I anticipated. But hey, that's not a bad thing. After all, Mitsumi punched Ghetsis in the face for being a jerk of a parental figure, so it wasn't all for naught.
Happy holidays, everyone!
~Lily