Chapter 7
I groaned as I awoke. I remembered falling through the floor in the Ruins of Alph, and I remembered screaming. Then I remembered everything going dark around me. Now I had woken up somewhere completely different. I slowly sat up and rubbed my head. "What the hell happened to me?" I asked myself, trying to get myself to focus enough to notice my surroundings.
As I looked up, I noticed I was sitting outside. I wasn't sure where, but I knew it wasn't the Ruins of Alph. There were trees and grass, neither of which had been in the Ruins of Alph. I felt the wind blow by and I quickly wrapped my arms around myself. It felt oddly cold. Not only that, but my outfit felt very drafty all of a sudden. I glanced down at myself and discovered why. I was completely topless!
"Where's my shirt?!" I shouted and quickly covered my chest. "And where's my jacket?" I began to look around frantically. "For that matter, where's my Pokemon?" I was about to stand to my feet when I heard something move in the nearby grass. I froze, panicking. I didn't know what it could be, and considering my current state of dress, I was worried about what it could be.
I relaxed when I saw Blaze step out of the tall grass. "You're finally awake!" Blaze spoke with a smile.
"Yeah, I'm...wait... 'finally' awake?"
Blaze nodded. "You've been asleep for a few hours now."
"Hours?!" I shouted. "What happened? I remember being in the Ruins of Alph, and then..."
"I don't know. I remember those creatures...Unown I think the researcher called them... swirling around you for a few moments, then you started screaming. Next thing I knew, everything went dark. Then a moment later, we were all here and you were asleep."
"A-and what happened to my clothes?"
"No idea," Blaze said without a single hesitation. "Things went black, then lit up and you weren't wearing your shirt, jacket, or hat anymore."
I sighed and groaned. "Why does the world hate me so much?" I then realized something, Blaze was the only one of my Pokemon around me. I reached down to my belt, but none of my pokeballs were there either. "Blaze...where did everyone go?"
"After you didn't wake up for a while, I asked everyone else to look for help."
"Well, I can understand that..." I sighed and stood up, still holding my hands over my breasts. "I'd like to know what happened to my clothes, though..."
Blaze nodded. "I wish I knew." She stepped up next to me and nuzzled my leg, before standing on her back legs. She was about a foot taller now then she was when she was a Cyndaquil, which meant she was now reaching my stomach in height. I myself was about five foot six at the time, and Blaze was now almost three feet tall.
"Blaze!" I heard a voice shout and I turned. It was Sadia! She was flying towards us as quick as she could. "Blaze, I got help! Ethan should be-" She stopped and looked at me. She stopped flapping her wings and set herself down on the ground as she looked up at me. "You're awake!"
I nodded with a smile. "Sorry to make you worry."
Sadia smiled back, or what you could call a smile as she was a bird. "It's fine, Kotone. I'm just glad you're okay." She stepped over to me and nuzzled against my leg.
"What were you saying a moment ago, Sadia?" Blaze asked.
"Oh! Alal and Ethan should be here in a minute."
"E-Ethan?!" I shouted. "But I'm half naked here!"
"So?"
"So? So?! I don't want Ethan to see me half naked!"
Sadia shrugged. "Could have fooled me, since you're always pulling your shirt down."
I blushed deeply and growled. I actually pulled my hands away from my chest and bopped Sadia on the head. "You be quiet!"
"Here!" I heard a loud voice bellow out and I immediately recognized it as Alal's. He may only speak one-liners, but he bellows, and when I say he bellows, I mean he bellows! I swear you could hear his voice from a mile away he talks so loudly.
"Kotone!" Ethan shouted and I watched him slide down Alal's back, performing a flip at the last moment and landing square on the ground. He rushed over to me. "Are you okay?"
"Fine now." I had completely forgotten that I wasn't covering my chest anymore.
"That's good. Your Pokemon came rushing into Violet City out of nowhere. Your Pidgey there started squawking in my ear. I may not understand Pokemon, but I can at least tell they were worried by their actions and expressions. I thought something had happened to you."
"Something did happen. That's why they went looking for you." I quickly explained what happened at the Ruins of Alph and what Blaze had told me about afterwards.
"Wow, that must have been one hell of an experience."
I responded with a simple nod.
"Now answer me this question...where are your clothes?"
My eyes went wide and I blushed heavily. I quickly covered my chest again and looked away from him. "W-well, the truth of that is...I mean...umm..." I sighed. "I don't know. I was like this when I woke up."
"That's terrible!" Ethan began to look around. "Someone must have taken your clothes while you were unconscious."
"Right, because someone is going to steal everything I own, but only from the waist up." I smacked Ethan over the forehead. "I fell through a hole in the Ruins of Alph. As I fell, my clothes vanished. No one took them."
"Then we should go check the ruins."
I shook my head. "I would love to Ethan. As soon as you can figure out where the hell the Ruins of Alph are and exactly how we get back in, you're free to."
Ethan stood there, silent for a moment. I was right. I didn't even know how I got there to begin with, let alone going back there now. Not to mention I fell into the Ruins and followed some weird symbol Pokemon thing into a secret room. There's no way I'd find all of that on my own again.
"Look, we'll just travel back to Violet City and I'll buy some clothes, okay?"
"You can't walk around Violet City half naked."
"You're right." I don't really know what compelled me to do this, but without hesitation, I dropped my shorts. "I'll take the rest of my clothes off." I had just started stepping out of my shorts when Ethan stopped me.
"Y-you can't walk around naked either."
"Well what the hell do you expect me to do? I don't have clothes, Ethan, and I can't buy clothes until I go to town."
Ethan glanced around for a moment, then he grabbed the bottom of his shirt. "Here." He lifted the shirt up and pulled it off, holding it out to me. "Wear this."
I stared at the shirt for a moment, then looked up at him. I felt something come over me at that moment and I grabbed his shirt and tossed it to the ground. I stepped forward and grabbed his pants. "You're sexy, you know that?" Ethan blushed at those words. I smiled. I was finally getting him to react the way I expected him to react. I dropped his pants to the ground.
"Wh-what are you doing, Kotone?" Ethan asked after a moment.
I wrapped my arms around his neck and pulled him close. "I still want you, Ethan." I reached down into his underwear and began to stroke him.
"K-Kotone..."
I pulled him closer and pressed my lips into his. I barely had to kiss him before I pulled away, my eyes wide. "Oh my god..."
Ethan looked down. He knew what it was that I had discovered at that moment. All this time, he hadn't reacted to my advances, he hadn't blushed in situations where he should have, he had barely even reacted this time. All of that, it wasn't me, or the fact he wasn't ready for it. He wasn't an idiot, and he definitely wasn't oblivious like I had that after all. It was all revealed in that kiss, the way he felt...
"You're fucking kidding me, right?" I asked in a serious tone. "All this time? All this fucking time?"
Ethan nodded. "I'm sorry. I...I didn't know how to tell you..."
"You didn't know how to tell me you were gay?!" I almost shouted. "Why didn't you just come and say so? All you had to do was walk up to me and be all 'Hey, Kotone, I think I'm gay'. No, you led me on...for years! You made me think I had a chance with you! I...I..." Tears rolled down my cheeks. "I've wanted you all this time! I wanted to give myself to you because I thought you were the right one!" I buried my face in his chest.
Ethan wrapped his arms around me and spoke softly. "I'm sorry, Kotone."
I cried, I really did. I spent the next several minutes crying, in fact. Ethan was the guy I loved, the guy I always imagined myself being with in the end. I imagined him and I down the road a few years. We were married, had a kid or two, we lived in a nice home. I was the Arceus damned Champion of both Kanto and Johto. All of that, all of my dreams, my desires, my very heart, everything shattered in a single moment.
I can't say how long Ethan and I stood there, but I know it was no small amount of time. I confessed everything to him through my tears. All my hopes, all my dreams, the very core of my feelings, I let them all out at that moment. I remember us sitting down in the grass after a few moments and Marill actually walked up to me. She hated me, but she knew something was terribly wrong. I don't think Marill understood, though, what had just happened, just that something Ethan had done had hurt me.
"You idiot!" Marill shouted at Ethan. "Making that bitch cry like that. That's my Arceus damned job."
"Not now, Marill," Ethan shoved her away, which made her angrier.
"You jerk!"
"Enough," I spoke up and Marill looked up at me. "Just...enough..." Marill stared at me for a moment before sitting down. Blaze moved over to her and the two began to talk to one another. I didn't pay attention to their conversation.
Finally, after a good period of time, I stood to my feet. I wiped my eyes, then picked up my shorts. "Ethan..."
"Yes, Kotone?"
I turned towards him and dropped my panties to the ground. "I'm going over to the ocean to take a quick bath. You want to join me?"
Ethan stared at me for a moment. I was completely naked in front of him, and not ashamed of it either. "Why do you want me to join you?"
I smiled. "Because, whether you're gay, straight, or whatever, I still like being near you. So, maybe we could sit together in the water and just relax together?"
Ethan smiled and nodded. He stood to his feet and he grabbed up the clothes he wasn't wearing anymore. We walked over to the nearby ocean from there and he dropped his underwear. I stepped carefully into the cold water and began to shiver. I hadn't even gotten myself in to my knees yet.
"You'll never get used to it that way," Ethan spoke up and stepped over to me. He smirked an evil smirk and I waved my hands. I was going to shout "no" but it was too late. He pushed me into the water. He then chuckled. "Get all the way in and you'll get used to it much faster."
"B-but i-it's fr-freezing!" I spoke through chattering teeth.
"You're the one who wanted to bathe in the ocean. Could have just put my shirt on and gone back to Violet City, but no, you wanted to go into the ocean." Ethan made that entire statement in a very mocking manner. I giggled and he jumped into the water next to me. We relaxed for a few moments as we got used to the water, then we dived down and actually swam around a bit. I had never done any sort of skinny dipping or anything of that manner before. For the first time in my life, I felt truly free.
Something in me after that changed. I'm not sure what it was, but after that, I had found myself having very few qualms with showing off my body. Maybe I had always felt reserved, only wanting Ethan to see it since I wanted him so badly, and now I was free of that, or maybe it was something completely different. All I know is, I didn't care anymore. My body was my body, and I'd be damned if someone hated me for showing it off to anyone I felt deserved the right.
We spent almost the entire rest of the day in the ocean. When we got out, we sat together in the grass nearby, letting our bodies dry before we put our clothes on. Ethan again offered me his shirt, and I took it. We dressed as the sun sat in the distance, and the two of us made our way back to Violet City. When we arrived, the sun had set and the moon was out. Violet City was alight with the brilliant lights of the street lamps and lights from houses. It was looking at a giant Christmas tree, at least, that's how I felt.
We traveled first to a shop where we could buy some clothes, and it didn't take me long to pick something out. Since I was being forced to completely change my look, I figured I might as well do it. I took a black, low-cut, sleeveless shirt along with a red, short-sleeved jacket to go over it. I undid my pigtails and pulled my hair back into one larger ponytail, then got a red baseball cap with a white back. I then twirled it around so it was backwards and I had some hair sticking out the front. I told Ethan that I did it because I liked how sexy he looked with his hat. That made him blush a bit and I giggled.
The last part was probably the hardest for me, though. I had been wearing short shorts for a long time, but since I was changing everything else, I felt it was time for me to change them as well. The shorts I had now were longer, reaching about my knees in length. They were still blue, they just weren't super short anymore. And that was that, I had changed my entire outfit, my entire image. I walked into the store as one person, and felt like I was walking out as someone completely different.
"Well, I guess this is it, huh?" I asked as I looked at Ethan.
"Doesn't have to be." Ethan smirked again. "You could let me take you out to dinner, too."
I blushed, but then nodded. He did just that, too. We went out to a restaurant, nothing really fancy, just a sit down place where it cost about five hundred pokédollars a person. Ethan and I ate, and we talked a bit more about what to do now. I had no hope of ever being with him, and I talked to him about that. We discussed how our lives should go, and discussed where we should try to meet up next. We agreed to try to meet again in Goldenrod City in a few weeks, but Ethan gave me one condition. I better not show up if I wasn't meeting him as a friend. I had to be over him, to have moved on. I agreed to that condition.
He then did something I didn't expect. He bought a room for both of us at a hotel. He didn't want me to sleep in the Pokemon Center. After all, they are required to accommodate trainers, but the best they can do is push a couple seats together, or let you sleep on a bench. He said I deserved to sleep in a bed. We lied down together that night to sleep. It was the first time I had ever actually slept with him. I felt a little sad that I was sleeping with him, but not in the sexual sense. However, I was accustomed to sleeping naked, so while we didn't have sex, I didn't sleep with my clothes on either.
I heard the alarm go off and I groaned as I reached out for it. I pushed the snooze, then turned back to snuggle against what I thought was Ethan. It was at that moment that I did not find a guy sleeping next to me, but instead, a pink sheep. "Lily?!" I shouted.
Lily giggled. "Hi, Kotone."
"Where have you been?! When the hell did you evolve?!"
"Last night. I went to go for help like Blaze asked, but as I made my way across Route 32, I got stopped by a pack of Rattata. I had to fight them off, and I thought I was going to lose. I thought my journey with you was over...but then it happened, a glow enveloped me and I felt myself empowered. I unleashed a Thunderbolt on everything, and afterwords, I realized I had evolved. I began to wonder after that, but I was lost. I didn't know where to go, then a boy named Ethan showed up. He brought me here and laid me in bed with you."
"Ethan did?"
Lily nodded. "He's a very sweet boy."
"He is." I smiled. "Well, since Ethan seems to have left already, we should think about doing so as well." My stomach growled. "Right after breakfast..."
I had barely stood to my feet when I heard a knock on the door. Someone on the other side called "Room Service" and I opened the door, peeking around it. A man was carrying a platter, and he held it out for me. "Breakfast, ma'am?"
"I didn't order anything, though..."
"That boy...Ethan was it? He did for you."
He was being so helpful all of a sudden. What was up with that? I sighed. Damn it all, Ethan! How am I supposed to get over you if you keep presenting yourself? I took the platter, thanked the man, then shut the door. There was food for the Pokemon as well, and we ate a nice breakfast, one unlike we had had since we started our journey. I then pulled my clothes on and grabbed my purse, the only thing I hadn't lost when I had lost everything else from the waist up. Also the only thing I hadn't changed from my original outfit. "Well, everyone? Let's go!" We headed out. Next stop was Union Cave and Azalea Town beyond that. Little did I know, though, that Destiny was about to play her cards, and they would not be in my favor.
