Blake returns to the Pokemon Academy! What awaits for him when he gets back? Will he have an important discussion with Ayame? What will happen then?

KedharS: Not the word I'd use to describe it.

Just a Bad Writer for Fun: It's definitely an issue that they would have to work through together.

Omesta: Thank you for your character submission.

Pokemon Academy: Beginning of Beginnings

Chapter 799

When the ferry reached the docks, Blake practically jumped out of it. He was in such a hurry he didn't even say goodbye to Kate. She was a little miffed about that, but she couldn't really blame him. She'd seen the way he was on the ferry, and how conflicted he was. She knew that he had a lot on his mind, and she also knew that she was the furthest thing from it.

She sighed, and closed her eyes in resignation, stepping off the ferry herself. What am I even doing? What was I expecting?

The fact that she was still hurt by the fact Blake's thoughts were solely on Ayame, without even sparing an instant for her, annoyed her quite a lot. When am I gonna get over him already?

She glanced down at the pokeball in her hand and the sad expression on her face gave way to a small smile. She squeezed it a little tighter.

There wasn't any point in lingering on her persistent feelings for Blake. Today had been too great of a day for her to spend it thinking about such a small thing like that.

With her head held high, she walked to the Gardening Club. It was dark now, but Kate knew that Alcea would still be in the clubroom.

"Milady, I'm back!" Kate called, peeking her head in. She saw that Alcea was sitting at the table, flipping through a book. Alcea glanced up at her, rising from her seat to greet her friend with a smile one her face.

The words died in Kate's mouth as she saw her friend.

Alcea concealed it well, she always did. Where Kate hid her feelings behind a biting veil of scowls and scathing remarks, Alcea did so behind her dignity and poise.

But no composed smile could hide the puffiness around her eyes. Even makeup could only do so much. It might have slipped by someone else, but for Kate, who'd admired Alcea for so long, the slump of her shoulders and the dimness in her eyes, the slight hollow tinge of her smile, it all spoke to one thing and one thing only.

Alcea had been crying.

"Milady!" Kate cried, her pokeball forgotten in her pocket as she rushed to her friend's side. "Are you okay?"

Alcea kept up her strong façade as best as she could. She tried to smile, she really did, but her expression cracked. She reached out her hand and stroked Kate's cheek.

"Please… don't call me that. Not right now," she whispered, on the verge of tears. "Please just… call me by my name, is it?"

"Alcea? What happened?" Kate felt her happiness from earlier dwarfed by the sight of her idol about to break down in front of her. "Is everything okay?"

"…It's over," Alcea sobbed, throwing herself into Kate's arms and crying into her shoulder.

Kate had no idea what to make of it. Alcea was the strongest girl she knew, in more ways than one. She wasn't the kind of person to break down crying like this. She didn't know what to do or what to say to comfort her friend, she just held her close and let her cry, gently patting her on the back and whispering soothing words.

"It's okay, Alcea," she murmured, stroking her friend. "It's gonna be okay…"

She didn't know what she was soothing her for, but that didn't matter.

While Kate comforted Alcea, Blake was booking it across campus, looking for his girlfriend. His first stop was Olivia's dormitory, but he was faced with the problem that he couldn't get inside without a key card. Aya was his usual way in. And Olivia couldn't help him, because she was in the infirmary and wasn't able to let him-

Olivia!

Blake could smack himself. How could he have been such an idiot this whole time? That whole ferry ride, and it hadn't even crossed his mind to get in contact with Olivia, the one person who would know where Aya was all the time!

He practically ripped his phone from his pocket and called her immediately, waiting anxiously as it rang and rang.

"Hello? Blake?"

"Olivia!" Blake practically shouted.

"…Okay, ow," she snapped, and Blake could see her narrowing her eyes from across the line. "Can you not yell at me right now, please? My ears are very sensitive."

Blake didn't know if she was serious or not, but he wasn't about to press the issue. He had more important things than volume control. He tried to restrain the eagerness in his voice. "Olivia, I'm looking for Aya. I haven't been able to get in contact with her. Have you heard from her? Do you know if she's okay?"

He tried not to sound too frantic.

"…Yeah, she's right here," Olivia said. That was all she could get out. Blake hung up immediately, turned, and ran for the infirmary.

Olivia stared at her phone.

"…Do you want me to put her on?" She bemusedly asked into the dial tone. With a smirk on her face she glanced up at Aya, who stared back at her incredulously. "So, someone's got a visit from her boyfriend coming up," Olivia purred.

Ayame blushed, brushing her bangs out of her eyes and looking down bashfully. She'd gotten the message from Blake earlier about going to the mainland with Kate, and the fact that he was looking for her so eagerly after getting back warmed her up inside.

Olivia didn't mention how frantic he sounded. She was concerned, but she didn't want to make her friend uncomfortable so she kept her thoughts to herself.

Fifteen minutes later, an out-of-breath Blake burst into the room, his face flushed.

"Hey, join the party," Olivia grinned, waving him inside. But he only had eyes for Aya, rushing over to her.

"Hey, welcome back," Ayame grinned, glancing up at him. "How was the mainland?"

"Oh, um, it… it was fine," Blake said. He was shifting from foot to foot, and Ayame could tell that something was wrong. Her grin faded into a look of concern.

"Hey, what's up? Anything wrong?" She asked, standing up and reaching out to him. She barely made it to her feet before Blake through his arms around her, hugging her with such force he nearly knocked her back into the chair.

Olivia whistled. "Hey, come on now, right in front of me, huh? Let's save that wild passion for the bedroom, you two."

"Boss!" Ayame exclaimed, shooting her a look of disbelief over Blake's shoulder. "Blake?" He was hugging her a lot tighter than he usually did, and she was starting to get confused.

"…Sorry, sorry," Blake said, dropping his arms and stepping back, his face red with shame. He glanced down in embarrassment.

"Hey, don't worry, I get it," Olivia smirked. "I'm cool. But still. Not in my room."

"I-I wasn't… not because of that!" Blake protested, his cheeks heating up. He glanced back at Ayame. "I-I wasn't, Aya, I swear."

Ayame tried not to look disappointed. "Then… what is it? I mean, don't get me wrong, you wanna make greeting me with a big tight hug a regular thing, be my guest! But you came in here looking like a ghost pokemon was chasing you, is everything okay?"

Blake glanced at Olivia again, then back at Aya. He wanted to say, but suddenly it was becoming a lot harder for the words to come out, especially with Olivia right here. He danced around the issue instead, taking a deep breath.

"Look, it's just… well… never mind. Let's talk about it later, okay?" He asked, forcing a smile onto his face to reassure Aya.

It didn't work very well. Ayame was anything but reassured. Blake had a wide variety of smiles, and she had seen enough of them to know which ones were genuine, which ones were fake, and which ones were "I'm smiling because I don't want the people who care about me to know that something's wrong."

But she didn't push it. She smiled back, giving him a genuine grin filled with warmth to try and raise his spirits, and nodded back. "Later, then," she agreed. "So how was it? You said in your texts you were going to go check out that… what was it, a pokemon store?"

Blake perked up. "You got my texts? Why didn't you text me back then?" It had slipped out before he could stop it. He didn't want to come across as too clingy and obsessive, but Ayame didn't mind it one bit.

"Well, there was a… thing," Ayame laughed, walking over to the counter and picking up a plastic bag filled with rice. "My phone sort of… got wet. I know it's waterproof, but just to be sure I put it in here to dry off."

Blake sunk down into the chair she'd been sitting in and massaged his temples with his fingers. So that was all it was. For the third time today he felt like the biggest idiot in the world. He'd been all urgent and frantic thinking something had happened to Aya, and it had just been that her phone had gotten wet and she was taking care of it.

It only reconfirmed what he already suspected, that his affection for her, more like his overprotective clinginess, was a problem that they needed to work through if they were going to have a healthy relationship moving forward.

He raised his head and smiled at Aya again. "The store… Aya, it was amazing! It was one of the most wonderful places I've ever been!"

"Really?" Ayame sidled close and pulled up another chair, sitting next to him. She was relieved by the sparkle in his eyes, it was genuine, unlike that smile she'd seen him wearing earlier. Whatever he'd seen at the store, thinking about it was clearly making him feel better.

"Yeah, just… it was great," he gushed. He didn't want to think about the potential problems, he wanted to think about the positive stuff from today. "There were just… so many pokemon! Wall to wall with enclosures for them, and even artificial terrains, it was great!"

"Wow, that does sound pretty amazing," Ayame laughed, nodding along with him. It sounded like a great place. "I'd love to see it!"

"Hey, we should go sometime!" Blake said. "Next time we have a day off, we can go out on a date there together, wouldn't that be great?"

"That would be amazing," Ayame agreed. "How about next weekend? Before we leave for the Orre Region, it would be great to have some memories of you to keep me tided over for a while, you know what I mean?"

Blake felt a stab in his heart. That's right. The Orre Region. He'd been trying to keep it out of his mind, but he couldn't. Aya was going on the junior/senior field trip, and he wouldn't see her for nearly two whole months. Then when she came back…

There wouldn't be much time left for the two of them before graduation.

"Yeah, that… that's right," Blake said, nodding. "We can do it right before then, sounds like a plan." It would be fun, the two of them, making some nice memories.

"Blake, she's saying she wants to have sex with you again afterwards, that's what she's really looking forward to," Olivia piped up.

Ayame's eyes widened and her face turned such a vivid shade of red Blake thought she would explode. She hid her face in her hands and stifled a scream.

Olivia cackled, and the couple shot her a pair of dirty looks.

Ayame cleared her throat and rose from her seat, taking Blake by the hand. "Come on, let's… let's get out of here and talk about it, okay Blake?" She glanced back at Olivia and stuck her tongue out. "Somewhere without the color commentary."

Blake followed her out of Olivia's room and into the hall, Aya turning to face him. He felt a pit well up in his stomach as he saw the tense look on her face.

"…So… what is it, then?" She asked quietly.

Blake blinked. "Huh? You mean the store? If you want to plan for our date, then we could-"

Ayame held her hand up and shook her head. "No, no, not that. I mean, yes, I want our date, definitely, but what's got you all tensed and worried?"

Blake swallowed. "Uh… I mean…" When she agreed to talk about this later, he didn't know she would mean a few minutes later. Was that why she'd taken him out?

"That… thing you mentioned before," Ayame said, glancing at him worriedly. She could see there was something going on, and as nice of a distraction the date idea had been, she had seen that it wasn't doing much to soothe his concerns. There was no avoiding this, it seemed."

Blake sighed. He glanced down the hall and spotted a small bench, leading Aya over to it so they could sit down. He rested his head in his hands and thought about how he should bring up this whole mess with her.

Finally, he decided that enough was enough, and he wasn't doing anyone any favors with his indecision. He needed to let her know what had been bugging him for the last few hours. He turned back to her and swallowed, "Aya… we need to talk."

And suddenly Ayame was as worried as Blake was. "W-Wait, Blake… this… no, you, you can't be serious…"

Blake was confused. "Aya, what are you-"

"You're breaking up with me?!" She sputtered. "After we JUST agreed on a date? What kind of sick thing is that?!"

Blake gasped, his jaw hitting the floor. "What?! Breaking up? What?! No, of course not, why the heck do you think I would be breaking up with you?!"

"Uh, because, that's how every breakup conversation ever goes? 'We need to talk'?" Ayame exclaimed, shaking her head in disbelief.

"Aya, I would have to be crazy to break up with you," Blake assured her. "You're the most wonderful thing that ever happened to me, trust me, it isn't that."

Ayame blinked, and settled down a little. "…Oh," she said, nodding. "…Okay then, sorry for… overreacting, I guess."

"Nah, sorry for… making everything so confusing," Blake said, trying to laugh a little bit. But with how tense he was feeling, the effect was pretty mediocre. "But… we do need to talk about something, there's… it is about us."

Ayame swallowed, reaching out to him. But she was too nervous to commit, pulling her hand back and looking warily into his eyes. She was afraid to ask, but she needed to know before he started, to assure herself. "Is… Is it something about me? Something I did?"

Blake's eyes widened. "What? No, no, of course not! This isn't about you at all, it's… it's about me. A problem that I have."

Ayame's heart went out to him. This time, her hand did reach. She gently rocked his knee, providing him as much support as she could. She could tell how tough this was for him. "Blake… if you need to talk, then let's talk. I'm ready to hear anything."

That was the push he needed. He knew it then, feeling her comfort, that he could confess anything to her. He knew it that night in her bedroom, when he told her his feelings.

"Aya… I'm worried about myself," Blake confessed, hanging his head. "With what happened with Reed today, and how worried I got, I just…"

"Wh-What? What happened with Reed? What are you talking about?" Ayame asked, feeling her heart skip a beat. Oh god. He had heard about the meteor nearly blowing her to pieces. No wonder he had come in there like a Zubat out of hell. "I-I… okay. Look! But it wasn't that big of a deal!" She cried. "It was just a small meteor, it didn't even hit me!"

"No, Aya, that's not what I- a meteor?!" Blake exclaimed. "What do you mean by a meteor?"

Ayame went pale. Oh. So he didn't know. "Oh, nothing, I was just-"

"Aya."

"Okay, fine!" Ayame sighed, slumping down in the bench and nursing her temples. "Look, Blake, it's not a big deal, it's just that there was a bunch of stuff with Reed and Darla, okay? They had a fight, and I was there, and one of Reed's pokemon used draco meteor, and the pier, well… kind of exploded." She said, making it sound like it was no big deal.

"Aya, you could have been killed!" Blake couldn't believe what he was hearing. So his paranoia hadn't been groundless, she really had been in danger. Hell, she'd nearly been crushed by a meteor just for being a bystander, and he hadn't been there to help.

He wished that learning that would be enough to convince him that he didn't need to have this conversation, but he knew that it wasn't. After all, whether or not Reed had actually been dangerous for Aya, that didn't change anything.

He was still too protective of her. Like she was made out of glass, and he was afraid that if she cracked, he would lose her.

"Blake, I know, and I promise, I'm gonna be more careful next time," Ayame assured him, thinking that he was so freaked out because of the incident. "It was just… a freak thing, nothing to get bent out of shape over, okay?" She squeezed his knee for good measure.

But Blake wasn't worried about that.

"Aya… it's not about this thing with Reed," he whispered, staring up into her eyes. He could feel the waterworks coming. "It's about me. It's about me, being afraid of losing you."

"Hey, what's wrong with that?" Ayame smiled, reaching out to wipe the tears from his eye. "I'm afraid of losing you, too. If something happened to you, I'd just die!"

Blake shook his head, pulling away from her. "No, it's… it's not that. It's different, trust me."

Ayame nodded. "Okay… how? How is it different?"

Blake sighed. "Aya… you're the best thing that ever happened to me. You know that, right?"

Ayame nodded again, grinning. Her heart was fluttering at how sweet he was being, even if she felt something weird going on. "Yeah, you… already said that," she laughed. "A lot of times."

"And sometimes, when I look at you, it just doesn't seem real," Blake said. "Like… you're really here. You're really dating me. I can't believe it sometimes. And when I think about what could happen if I lose you, if something were to happen to you… I don't know how I would live with myself. I feel like it's my job to protect you, to keep you safe, and… it's not."

"…So what are you saying?" Ayame asked quietly. She didn't like the way this conversation was going.

"I'm saying that I love you," he whispered. "But I'm also saying… our relationship has a lot of problems. Because I don't know if I'm loving you the right way."

Ayame was numb when she heard that. She didn't know what to say.

What does Blake mean? That he's not loving Ayame the right way? What will this mean for their relationship?