It started last week. Which was, in itself, innocent enough.
Solana hadn't thought much of it at the time- why would she? It was a simple question, thrown her way over shared dinner in one of the booths within the Base's commissary.
"Are you busy next Thursday?" The words had come out of the blue as they sat down with their homemade little personal pizzas: Lunick on one side of the table, Solana on the other, with their Pokémon already chowing down on a bowl of kibble on the floor by their feet. Completely within their usual.
"Not particularly," she replied passively, breaking up a nanab berry to add as a treat to the Pokémon's food and not even bothering to look at her best friend as she gave him his answer. "Why so?"
He waved his hand in dismissal. "No reason," was all she got, before he changed topics altogether. Honestly, within seconds, Solana had pretty much forgotten all about the odd inquiry.
Until the weekend. When he asked again.
They were washing dishes together- one of the around-the-base tasks they were still obligated to do in order to help out even when off active, official duty. Lunick splashed her with a particularly sizable soap bubble mound, and Solana gasped at the indignance of doing such a thing before elbowing him in the side. "Uncalled for," she chastised, whilst secretly already plotting how she could get him back even worse. But he just crossed his arms with a smirk, tossing a damp towel over his shoulder.
"Absolutely called for," he insisted, puffing out a curt exhale to blow some of the dark hair out of his face. "Oh, by the way, I meant to ask! What are you up to on…" He pretended to count on his fingers, before nodding in affirmation. "The 14th?"
The ruse worked, because Solana was too enwrapped in figuring out her revenge to put the two and two together of what month it was. "Mmm… nothing?" The answer was more of a question, before she did the math herself. "That's this upcoming week, right? We have our in-house training drill day on the 13th, I think, but other than that… no specific missions or anything, no."
He smiled. "Perfect. Just making sure I wasn't missing something."
An inkling in her head prodded to ask what he meant by that cryptic phrasing, but she let it slide, instead opting to turn the flexible sink head directly at his chest and slamming him with a spray of water for good measure. "Only thing you missed was your chance to run while you had it!"
…Then, once again, came Monday.
The two of them sat in the common room on the first floor of the base, both in various states of dishevelment after having worked on their statements for the past few hours. They were written forms; pieces to help the operators file and document all the things they had done in the field within the past week or two back to the Ranger Union. It was certainly one of the less glamorous sides of being a Ranger, but at least they were able to do it in their casual wear and slumped against the base of the couch, huddled over the coffee table.
Lunick groaned from where he was draped: his head was dangling off the edge of the cushion that he sat upside down within, and reached out to snatch Solana's pen right out of her hand to get her attention. "Hey. Hey," he insisted, breaking the peaceful silence that had settled over them just enjoying one another's company as they worked. "We don't have anything going on this week, right?"
Solana hesitated for a moment, indecisive on whether this was actually another inquiry specifically about Thursday for some reason or not. Her mouth was agape, poised to question why his sudden fascination with her schedule on that date in particular, but she shut it again, and shook her head. He didn't actually ask- he was just talking about the week as a whole so it seemed; so she gave him the benefit of the doubt.
It was a mistake she should have learned by now not to do when she knew he was up to something.
When he asked again on Wednesday, she had finally reached her breaking point on the topic.
Once a month, as per their contract with the International Union, all Rangers had to perform a routine set of training exercises for grading and monitored upkeep of their required skills. It wasn't the same day for everyone- there was a definite rotation in place to ensure the area still had enough Rangers out in the field, but those who tended to work together most usually shared their in-house training day to better their synergy.
The day consisted of a variety of tasks: capture challenges, timed physical obstacle tests, and written examinations to document that they were up-to-knowledge on which PokéAssists were best used against which targets, to name a few. At the moment, Lunick and Solana were practicing their hand-to-hand combat; it wasn't something that came up particularly often in their line of work, but all Rangers were required to be proficient in it anyways in case of an emergency threat situation.
And, for the two of them in particular, it was a fun excuse to get to roughhouse with each other. Both were exceedingly competitive: Solana out of a thirst to win, and Lunick out of the desire to get to mess with Solana. So days like these were actually quite enjoyable, as they became much more a prolonged game for top spot than anything else.
Once the whistle had been blown, both of the Rangers ran at one another from the opposing corners on the cushiony safety mat they fought on, crooked and mischievous grins on their faces at the notion of getting to whoop their best friend's ass. Solana was the first to lunge out at him, and the both of them fell into a rhythm of trying to strike and then subsequently parrying the blow. Back and forth they went, practically circling one another around the mat, until Solana tried to drive her forearm down onto his shoulder and he blocked it with his own, leering in as they pushed against one another and then cheekily speaking in a plain matter, as if this were a very normal conversation happenstance. "Hey, Sol. You doing anything tomorrow?"
The blue-haired girl grumbled in her surmounted frustration, and broke around him to grab his wrists in a vice grip that twisted behind his back so he was in a compromised position, much akin to someone being arrested. "What!" She spat out, unable to see the very pleased, troublemaking smile on his face at finally riling her up enough with the asking to get a reaction like this. "WHAT do you need tomorrow?! YES, I am free! What is with your obsession of asking if I'm busy?!"
Biting his tongue to contain a snicker that would reveal him too soon, he kicked one of his legs out behind him, swiping her own right out from underneath her and spinning to pin her down to the ground once she'd hit it. Flipping his hands as she fell, he grabbed both of her wrists in a locking grip and shoved them to the mat, a very jubilant look on his face. "I just keep hearing rumors," Lunick teased, having the gall to push the 'joke' one step further by crooning forward to hover over her. "Everyone keeps saying that we're going to be each other's Valentine. I'm just curious to know if those rumors are true~!"
If the hard collision with the wrestling mat had not been enough to knock the wind right out of Solana's chest, the answer she had gotten surely was. She puffed out a curt exhale and writhed her arms in a futile attempt to escape his scrutiny, but it was fruitless. "You are insufferable," she ultimately concluded; a meek attempt at regaining at least the banter high ground, when in reality he had her quite literally pinned right where he had wanted her. Something about the way he had been so insistent, and the position of delivery of the taunt, mixed with the subject matter… her brain felt like it was short-circuiting, a little. She couldn't find any of the right words, much less hardly anything to say at all.
"And you're down for one… two…!"
"Alright!" Solana shook her head, pushing with nearly everything she could muster to send him tumbling off of her. She rose to her knees and took a few haughty deep breaths, pointing at him in an accusatory way as he just laughed at how flustered her face looked. "I'll tell you what." Solana straightened her headband, patting off any dust from her uniform. "You win this combat, and I'll be your Valentine. Fine?"
Lunick snickered, pushing himself up to his feet and retreating back toward his corner so they could have a fair fight in earnest. "Gotta say, Sunshine. That ought to be the most unorthodox way I've ever seen someone ask~!"
"I wasn't-! Ugh!" She charged at him in her fury of his aggravating behavior, grabbing him by the waist and trying to throw him onto the ground. But he was of much more level head, and writhed right out, flipping the script. The two of them wrangled one another and fought for a little bit, but within a minute, Lunick had her back toppled down onto the mat again, a laugh even escaping from her mouth as they called the match in his favor.
As hard as she may seem to get frustrated with it, this back and forth with him was one of her ultimate favorite parts of their friendship. And he knew it. He knew her better than anyone else.
Pursing his lips together in a thin line and squinting down at her, he shook his head. "You didn't even try," he stated blatantly, quiet enough so only she could hear him.
And he was right, even if she would never admit it: the second she had offered the ultimatum, she knew she would purposefully lose. But she couldn't openly admit that guilty truth. "Did too," Solana hissed back at him, sticking her tongue out childishly.
"Liar," Lunick huffed and just rolled his eyes in complete amusement, sitting up and getting off of her, before holding a hand out to help her stand up too. She took it, pulling herself to her feet and brushing some hair out of her face.
It was time for them to start wrapping up their assessments for the day anyways, so she just waved it off, grabbing him by the uniform and dragging him excitedly towards the Grassland Capture Arena. "Last one to the Capture Challenge has to get the flowers~!" She joked, releasing her hold before bolting out the door, with him hot on her tail.
That was yesterday.
Though she'd done her best to hide it, Solana was truthfully a bit of a bumbling mess about the whole debacle when behind closed doors. She'd always secretly adored when the region teased the two of them for being inseparable, and while she knew being one another's valentines was (at least… partially) a joke, it still didn't stop the way her chest tightened whenever she remembered it was true. Her morning proceeded normally enough: it wasn't like it was out of the usual for her to get up early enough to pick up breakfast for the both of them and bring it back upstairs for them to split in his dorm room, anyways. But it still made her heart race today nonetheless.
Picking off a piece of the red velvet muffin she'd grabbed for him and feeding it to Plusle on her shoulder as tax, Solana rode the elevator back up to the living quarters' floor. She made her way to his door that she knew so well, kicking the base of it as a means to knock since her hands were preoccupied with their shared food tray. "Oh, valentine~!" She teased in a singsongy manner, the grin already unfurling on her face. "Nothing like having your wonderful partner deliver breakfast in bed, dontcha think?"
The door clicked open, but as per their regular routine, it wasn't Lunick who had opened it from the other side. It was his Minun, whose body weight was juuuust barely heavy enough to lay on the long part of the handle and cause it to drape down and unlatch, allowing Solana to be able to back up into it and push it open enough to get through. "Thank you, Minun," she praised softly, before crossing the room and setting the tray onto Lunick's desk. He, on the other hand, chewed the inside of his lip nervously as he began to stir from all the commotion- the bold greeting had flustered him more than he would've liked to let on. Sure, she brought him breakfast almost every day, but something about this time just felt far more intimate than the others, with the ramifications of the holiday surrounding it. And it resonated, as he thought about what things would be like if she meant those words for real… just how much he wished that they were. He did his best to damper the blush that followed, and rolled to face her, giving a squinty and crooked smirk as he peeked his eyes open just enough to see his best friend right on schedule with her wake up call.
"Morning, Sol," his voice was still groggy from waking up, and something about it made Solana's cheeks darken a few shades too as she stepped up to his bedside, reaching forward to rake a hand through his bangs and push them up out of his face to reveal his rarely-seen forehead.
Huffing with a smile, her eyes flickered around the room, before shooting him a playful pout and standing up straight again, arms crossing her chest. "What? No flowers for me?" She was entirely just teasing, but he groaned in response, sitting up and quick to swing his feet out of bed.
"No," he confirmed, gently grabbing her shoulders as he stood and pushing her out of his way, backwards to fall and sit on his bed in his place. He turned his attention to the drawers of his desk and rifled through a few of them, having already stuffed a chunk of the muffin she'd gotten for him in his mouth, and not even bothering to have the decorum to finish chewing it before he talked. "You're not the type of girl to want flowers, anyways."
It was true- she didn't hold much value in bouquets the way other people seemed to; she would have much rather seen a field of flowers intact and in the ground than any grouping of them in a vase. Lunick seemed to find what he was looking for, and grabbed the thin box before slamming the drawer shut, holding it out in her direction with a toothy smile. "Chocolate covered rawst berries, however…"
Her face lighting up at the notion of the sweets, Solana snatched it right out of his hands, very pleased with the turn of gift-giving events. Even though he was by far the more food-motivated one of the two, she did tend to have a sweet tooth when it came to certain things, and this was one of them. "Hmm." She resigned in agreement, holding the box close to her chest and eyeing him up with apprehension. "And how many of these did you help yourself to already, I wonder…?"
Sitting on the edge of his bed next to her, Lunick laughed at the accusation, flicking open the full box and picking one up, popping it into his mouth right there in front of her. "...One." He pointedly answered with a mouthful, tossing out the leafy top away and into the trashcan at his bedside.
Solana helped herself to one as well, and they were just as delicious as she was hoping. It wasn't often she had them, but she knew they were a very popular treat for Valentine's Day… Which did beg the question in her mind, though, of just how long he'd been planning getting these if she only agreed to the ruse yesterday.
It was a question she decided she didn't want the answer to, and would rather choose to leave up to mystery in order to allow herself to hope the truth would have been the answer she wanted, instead of that he just picked them up last minute for the sake of the joke.
They split the rest of the treats and the breakfast she had brought up for them to share, laughing and enjoying the quiet moments of a morning spent privately together before heading down to the Base's lobby for their pre-shift briefing. As Solana had promised multiple times over; there were no important missions today that required their presence and attention, so all of the active duty Rangers for the day were allocated in patrolling pairs around the parameters of the Ringtown Base's region of operation. Lunick and Solana were given the assignment of patrolling to the south of the town itself: where the trees started again and led to a thin band of forest that was generally closed off and not for public use, as it led to a sharp cliffside down to where the landmass met the ocean that would certainly be catastrophic to fall from. Patrolling there was typically more of a job of ensuring the wild pokemon and natural infrastructure were all okay, and every rare once in a while steering lost civilians back towards the town itself for their safety. It was definitely one of the quieter patrol routes, but it was a peaceful one, as it felt almost like it was a place all their own, where no one else could bother them.
"We haven't been down to the cliffs in a while," Solana mused under her breath, shooting her closest friend a soft smile. "Turns out you do get to spend the day with me all for yourself after all."
Heeding their assignment, both Lunick and Solana hoisted their respective electric types onto their shoulders and exited the Base, headed for the southmost part of town. The second they were out of the front doors and reasonably out of teasing range, Lunick caught her off guard by grabbing her hand with his own, a cheeky grin on his lips. "Can't go losing you out there, Valentine." She rolled her eyes at the toying wink that followed, and wasn't even given the chance to scoff yet by the time he followed up. "Joining me for a long walk on the beach, this day just gets better and better…!"
"I'd hardly consider a wooded, dangerous cliffside a beach," she was quick to correct with a coy laugh at his ridiculousness, yet entertained his notion nonetheless by affirming their grip on one another and sliding their fingers between each other's in order to knit the handhold even further. Her face was alight a pink glow; it wasn't as if the two of them had never held one another before, not by any means. But that was the fickle thing about crushes- they never got easier, no matter how many times the lines blurred.
"Ah! Lunick! Solana!" Their moment was interrupted by a young man who lived in town, only a few years older than them, if any at all. They generally knew just about all the town's residents pretty well since Ringtown didn't exactly boast a large population, and this man was no exception. He was clutching a heart-shaped box, presumably of chocolates, and both Rangers' attention turned to him immediately, startled from being caught fraternizing on the clock. It was clear the man did anything but mind that though, as right after approaching them, he smiled, and gestured between the two. "Oh! I'm so happy to see you are celebrating today with one another after all. I'm sure the rest of town will be too, you know this whole region's rooting for you two!"
It wasn't intended to be intrusive nor over the top, but it fumbled both receiving parties all the same, and they stammered a ragged attempt of response to that. But what could they really say? I mean, today especially, it's not like they even could deny that they had agreed to be one anothers' valentine. All they could do was fight to talk over one another, then both stop to let the other speak, before Lunick finally cleared his throat and forced a toothy and sheepish smile on his face. "That's so… Kind, of you to say, Anthony…!" He squeezed Solana's hand even tighter, searching for backup from her, and nodded for the other man to go on. "Was there something you needed assistance from us for? You certainly seemed to have a strong motive when you first came up!"
"Yes!" The resident exclaimed, cascading back into his frenzy of preparation for his date. "Is it true? Surely you two would know best, you have a pulse on everything around here! Are there really Luvdisc in the river up in Lyra Forest? Arceus, I just know my date would go perfect so long as we got to see one!"
Solana chimed in via gesture, her eyebrows knitting in confusion before she shook her head just the tiniest amount. "I'm sorry, Tony, but Luvdisc are saltwater Pokémon. I highly doubt you'd find any even in the backmost areas of Lyra, as the water sources there are all fresh water. They don't even get brackish until closer to Fall City." She smiled consolingly, before talking with her hands to emphasize her next suggestion. "You should take your date to Summerland, if either of you have a flying Pokémon or you can catch the ferry! They're reef Pokémon, so I bet you'd really have a good shot at seeing them in the waters there! Usually they're most often found hiding in the branches of Corsola nearby, so if you can find any of those, you can probably find Luvdisc not too far away!" She pulled out her styler with her free hand, and scrolled on it for half of a second in deep focus before her face lit up. "The next ferry leaves Fall City harbor… at 12:30! If it's integral to your plans for the day, I would definitely take them there!"
The young man heeded her advice with a swift nod, already checking his watch to coincide with her info. "Oh! I can… I could maybe meet them… Gah! Thank you! I hope your date goes much smoother than mine has been!" And with the well wishes he was off, leaving the friend pair to descend into flustered messes once again at that bidding of adieu. Solana pointedly avoided eye contact with Lunick for the short term, but he did nothing but gape directly at her in awe, allowing himself to be dragged to the outskirts of town before anyone else of the residents could make comment.
"Since when were you an expert on Luvdisc Biology…?" He asked in bewilderment, shocked at the amount of detail she was able to give. While yes, both of them were exceedingly knowledgeable about all the Pokémon typically native to the region, the way she spat out everything so plainly like it was second nature had him befuddled in the most inspired way, and it was as if he were remembering why she amazed him every day all over again.
"They're native to Hoenn," Solana explained plainly, a nostalgic smile on her lips. "The Gym Leader from my hometown actually used one on his team, even. So I'm pretty familiar with them."
Lunick huffed with a nod, carefully stepping over some underbrush to keep up with her as to not give any reason to let go of their conjoined hands. The both of them began their patrol route together, snaking through the thick wooded area and rocky clearings a few times over, and it really was nice to have each other all to themselves, just as Solana had joked about.
Things had calmed down teasing-wise over the course of the morning, and they had even gotten to take some time to coerce and befriend a small family unit of Treecko to play with them and Plusle/Minun in one of the few natural clearings that their patrol area had within it. Which… was technically not something that had required their assistance, but they certainly planned to write it off as recordkeeping notes for future reference in case they needed cut field assists on their day's work anyways.
By the time they actually reached the cliffside, Lunick was ready to take a well-deserved break to enjoy the secret hideaway, since nothing else on their route thus far demanded their dire attention. He let go of her hand to pass ahead of her and jump up onto one of the huge jagged rocks, sweeping his arms out dramatically as he faced her with a big grin. "Now THIS is a view!"
"Be careful…!" Solana warned, albeit not fully getting her message across with the right urgency given the way it was paired with a giggle at his overdramatics. "If you get hurt it will be me left with all the paperwork!"
"And heartbreak~!" He added as a tease, but it was true. He was fluid in his motion to turn and sit down on the protruding cliff and cross his legs beneath him, before looking back with a small snicker as he patted the spot next to him. "Plan on joining your darling valentine here, or what?"
"What," she snarkily chose the latter, but hypocritically climbed up in stride to take his invitation and hoisted herself to sit right beside him. The second she sat, his arm was instantly wrapped around her side to hold her close, and she melted right into him for it. "... This really is a breathtaking view. I get why the public can't come down here, but I feel very lucky that we do."
Lunick let out a small sigh in agreement, dropping any joking insincerity and falling into her new tone of somber honesty as his thumb skimmed one of the seams on the waist of her uniform. "Yeah…" He trailed off, having nothing to add to her sentiment and just wholeheartedly conceding with what she had said. He glanced over at her fondly, just for a moment, before leaning forward a little, having noticed an uptick in splashing commotion beneath them. "Oh my Arceus! Look Sol!"
He let go of her to point directly down off of the cliffside to the rocky waters below, a bright and excited smile on his lips. Solana's eyes followed, and she saw quickly what he was pointing at- but instead of the jubilant and awestruck expression he wore, her breath left her chest and her face began to sear a bright crimson of knowing the implications of what it meant.
"Luvdisc!" Lunick exclaimed, and even though they were tiny from the distance, the color and curvature of them as they leapt and played in the foamy waters was unmistakable. "A whole school of them, too! I can't believe it!" He laughed, and the way his face lit up at the sight so adorably most certainly did not help temper Solana's flushed reaction. "I guess Anthony was right that there was Luvdisc by Ringtown, after all."
"... Uh-huh!" She had grabbed a fistful of Lunick's pantleg out of disbelief when she saw it, and now gingerly forced herself to let go of the grip and smooth it back out in effort to not raise too many questions.
But unknowingly, Lunick said everything that could make the matters worse. "Too bad he can't come and see these. I guess they decided to only come just for us!" He laughed at his own joke, before breaking his gaze away from the massive school of them to look at Solana, and his face fell immediately at her nearly panicked expression. Instinctively, he reached up and cupped either side of her face to express his genuine concern, all the attention in the world within his eyes. "Are you okay? What's wrong?"
Blistering right there on the spot, she quickly nodded, covering his hands with her own and hurried to reassure him. "I-I'm fine! It's okay…!"
"...Is it the Luvdisc?" Still visibly worried, he let her take his hands and drop them to her lap, peeking over his shoulder down the edge of the cliff again to get a good look. There were so many of them that the waters practically looked pink, and truthfully, he hoped there really wasn't anything wrong with that, because it was a breathtaking sight he had been loving getting to share with her. "Is it bad that they're down there? Should we tell so-"
"No!" His best friend interrupted frantically, and it snapped his attention back to her, before she let out an awkward and sheepish laugh. "It's… You remember how I know a lot about Luvdisc, yeah?"
Lunick just nodded intently, more focused on listening to her words than she'd practically ever seen anyone before. And it amplified the butterflies that absolutely consumed her chest cavity right now. "I… There's uh, there's these rumors about it…! The reason Anthony was so insistent on bringing his date to see one, for example." She squeezed his hands, and then swallowed thickly, letting out another laugh at the whole situation, because of course it happened like this. "Besides the fact that they just look like sideways hearts, there's myths that… well, basically, if a couple finds one, uh, it's supposed to mean that they will be promised with an eternally loving relationship that never ends."
Her best friend took a solid few seconds to process her words, and she could swear she could physically see the little Klink gears turning in his brain as he worked out what she was saying. "Oh," he eventually spoke, nearly quiet enough to be missed, as he looked down once more. And that was all just if they saw one. There had to be hundreds of them right now, splishing and splashing about right beneath them, where no one else could even bear witness.
"Yeah," Solana breathed out, looking down at her lap shyly before letting out a small laugh. "So definitely don't tell anyone we saw them, unless you never want to hear the end of it."
Lunick pressed his lips together in a thin smile at her redeeming humor, and let go of her hands in order to delicately push back some of the light blue hair that had fallen into her face. "The secret's safe with me," he promised, and before he knew what exactly he was even doing, Lunick had leaned forward and pressed a quick, ginger kiss to her forehead before scrambling back up to his feet in order to prevent himself from acting upon anything else he might regret. He planned to just write even that slip-up off to the Valentine's Day act, but couldn't fight off the genuine, prideful grin that sneaked onto his lips at the delight of having gotten to kiss her, no matter how miniscule. "…Solana! Slacking off on patrol?! I cannot believe you!" He offered as an escaping tease from having to acknowledge the situation more if she didn't want to. Then dared to put his hands on his hips and gasp in fake offense, knowing full well he was the one who suggested they stop for the scenic lookout in the first place.
And, like clockwork, she scrambled to her feet, a bright smile on her lips too as she jumped off of the rock they'd been sitting on to meet him back on solid ground and grab him by the shoulders. "You are the worst," she chided, but the bright grin and tone of complete adoration betrayed her harsh words. And he couldn't help but let his arms wrap around her back just for this second, smiling down on her from the small height difference between them.
"I know," he vowed, and offered his hand as he stepped forward to continue their patrol together, as if nothing had changed. And, more grateful and fallen for him than ever before, Solana took it.
