ARTIST: theconfusedartist (Art is available on the 365daysofusuk tumblr)

AUTHOR: Anonymous

28th of November, 2014 - Rivals

Alfred was a child of the Pokémon generation. He'd been seven years old when the craze hit his school, sweeping the student body like an epidemic. It was like everyone's brains had been rewired overnight, for all of a sudden the kids at school were speaking in a new language of "Type matchups" and lusting after "rare Pokémon" – and all the adults could do was look on in confusion and hope the epidemic died down before all their money disappeared on the cheap card game that seemed to be the only cure.

Alfred had loved the cards and the TV show, of course, but he had always been more of a video game geek, so he quickly developed an obsession with Pokémon Red. E got Pokémon Yellow, too, when that came out, and he would never in his life forget the thrill of the release of Pokémon Gold, and the arrival of a hundred brand new Pokémon.

Alfred continued to buy the games throughout his teenage years, even though his friends and peers all grew out of their Pokémon obsessions along the way to high school. Alfred understood, of course, but at the same time he didn't understand how you could just quit Pokémon like that! When you were a kid in the 90s and you knew what it had been like growing up in the era of the Pokémon craze, he really didn't see how you could just stop loving the franchise. It had changed their worlds, and brought everyone together, and Alfred was sure he would love it till the day he died.

Besides, when new games were released they provided all the fun of nostalgia along with the excitement of modern video games, so Alfred couldn't help but buy every generation that came out.

Naturally, that meant Alfred arrived to the store bright and early on the release date of Pokémon Alpha Sapphire and Omega Ruby.

Alfred had opted to go to university in England, so he'd bought a European 3DS when they were released a few years ago. He soon realised this was a big mistake when all the games he wanted were released days, weeks, or sometimes even months after North America. (The movie situation was even worse, but that was a whole other story.)

Waiting for video games when they were already available in other countries frustrated Alfred, but his shock and distress over the Pokémon delay was the worst. Everyone in America and Japan had been playing Pokémon Alpha Sapphire and Omega Ruby for a week before Alfred could go to the store and pick up his reserved copy of Omega Ruby. It was just plain outrageous, and he'd been kind of sulky about it all week.

But when he arrived at the store and saw the posters of the legendaries Groudon and Kyogre, he instantly relaxed. It felt like coming home. He suddenly had vivid memories of picking up his original copies of Pokémon Sapphire and Ruby as a pre-teen, excited about the new Pokémon and wondering what new features the games had in store.

There was nothing like picking up a brand new Pokémon game as a child, and even at twenty-two, Alfred's heart fluttered in excitement.

"Jones?! What the hell are you doing here?"

His heart sank when Alfred recognised the voice and he turned to find possibly the only person who could bring him down on such a special day.

Arthur Goddamn Kirkland. The pretentious postgrad douchebag who somehow, despite not taking the same course or living in the same building as Alfred, managed to walk into the American's life every day and piss him off royally. Alfred didn't know why, but Arthur just irritated him, and the other man must have felt the same because whenever they came across each other they ended up arguing. It could get quite heated, and they'd been separated by friends or university staff on several occasions.

It didn't help that Arthur was always finding Alfred at the worst moments, only adding fuel to his teasing and taunts, and now the older student had found him in the middle of a half-empty video game shop.

Alfred bristled, feeling embarrassed and defensive about being caught in exactly the kind of place Arthur would mock him for. But there was really no way to hide what he was doing at a video game store, so if he didn't want Arthur to pick on him for buying a kids' game, he might as well own it.

"Um, buying video games, what the hell do you think I'm doing at 'GAME?'" Alfred countered, rolling his eyes condescendingly.

Arthur flushed, probably realising how stupid a question it had been. Perhaps he was as surprised to see Alfred as Alfred was to see him.

"Well, obviously," the British student recovered quickly, with a glare of his own. "I meant, what are you doing here at 9:30 in the morning. Don't you have class?"

It was Alfred's turn to blush. He glanced down at the floor in embarrassment, and suddenly noticed the game Arthur held in his hand.

"Is that Alpha Sapphire?" he asked, shocked.

Arthur glanced down at the game clutched in his hand, as if seeing it for the first time. Then he jumped, and hid it behind his back, flustered.

"Um, it's for my brother. My little brother," Arthur said quickly. "He's at school and asked me to pick it up for him."

Alfred eyed the other man suspiciously.

"If he's at school, why did you feel the need to arrive at the store's opening time? You could get it at lunch, or he could pick it up himself after school."

"Uh, well…I mean…that is to say…"

Arthur was clearly floundering, his eyes darting around the store, and Alfred realised the Englishman was lying. He had bought Pokémon for himself, and was embarrassed to admit it.

Alfred grinned victoriously.

"Oh, Kirkland, there's no need to be ashamed of a little guilty pleasure," he teased. "If you like playing Pokémon just say so. It's kind of embarrassing to pretend you're buying it for your little brother. If you were more honest with yourself then people might actually respect you."

Alfred reached over to the display of shiny red and blue Pokémon games and picked up a copy of Pokémon Omega Ruby.

"See, I'm not going to lie about it. I'm here to buy Pokémon, too. But the difference between you and me is that I buy my video games like a real man and don't use my little brother as an excuse."

Arthur stared at Alfred with a mix of horror and anger and disbelief etched across his face. He clearly wanted to make fun of Alfred, but there wasn't much he could say when he was also here to buy a kids' video game.

Eventually he received, standing up straight and crossing his arms haughtily.

"I should have known you'd be into something like this," he said, disdainfully. "But you're far too immature to understand the real allure of Pokémon. I bet you don't even care about EV training or putting together a real team. You're probably just in it for the pretty colours and cute monsters."

Alfred snorted. "Psht! As if! I bet I could whip your ass any day in a Pokémon battle!" he declared.

"Oh, I would love to see you try," Arthur sneered at him.

"Awesome," Alfred smirked, taking a step closer to the British student. "All I need is seven days on this game and I'll already have a team that will crush your Pokémon to smithereens."

"Why not make it three days," Arthur glared, taking a step forward himself, refusing to be intimated.

"Why not two?" Alfred retorted, eager to one-up his arch-nemesis. "Saturday night. Meet at my house at 7:00 and we'll see who's the better Pokémon Trainer."

"Fine by me. I just hope you don't get your hopes up too high: it would be embarrassing to beat you as quickly as I will if you think you actually stand a chance."

"Big talk coming from such a little guy. You'd better bring you're A-game so you don't have any excuses for losing to me so badly."

They stood there, almost nose to nose, staring each other down, until a nervous employee came over and asked if they needed help finding what they were looking for.

They separated then, paying for their games and going home to vigorously train their Pokémon for the next 48 hours.

It wasn't until lunch time that Alfred realised that he kind of technically had pretty much asked Arthur on a date to come round his house Saturday night and play video games.

First he was horrified.

Then he laughed.

And then the more he thought about it, the more he liked the idea.

By the time Arthur arrived on Saturday (blushing and nervous, for he had also been pondering the "date" aspect of this arrangement) Alfred wasn't so keen on thrashing Arthur's Pokémon team and making his rival cry.

He was kind of more interested in enjoying his favourite video game with a fellow fan, and getting to know that cute older student who'd been on his mind ever since they met in September.