Cover Art: Amasw.

Teams:

Pierce Lawson:

- Narcissa, Beedrill

- Orion, Onix

- Cygnus, Abra

- Bellatrix, Gyarados (Shiny)

- Andromeda, Vaporeon

Lillian Dale:

- Root, Bulbasaur

- Talon, Spearow

- Gem, Geodude

- Star, Cleffa

Cerulean City XXXIII

"I'll admit," Daisy commented, twirling her wine glass a little while looking at him. "I didn't expect you to take me up on that offer, at all. It was quite the surprise when you agreed."

"I don't know why you'd be," he replied, bringing his own glass to his lips. He wasn't drinking wine though. He'd never liked it and the restaurant they were at, one located at the shore of Cerulean's beach, felt a little too fancy to ask for beer or soda, so he'd just gone for the boring just water option. At least the food looked great though, so that'd be nice, and it was also not fancy enough to make him uncomfortable. Daisy had good taste, unsurprisingly. "You are gorgeous and you are the opposite of a blonde stereotype, so…"

"Why thank you," she replied, clearly amused. She was also pleased at the compliment though and it showed in her smile too. "But I don't need to be told I'm a catch," she said, her smile growing even wider before she shook her head. Something told him that she wouldn't mind if he did so anyway, so he took a mental note about that. "You said you weren't interested in anything at the moment or something like that."

"And I wasn't," he replied, leaning back on his seat and looking out at the waves licking at the sand.

"If I'm prying-"

"Hey, we are on a date," he interrupted, turning back to her and giving her a half-smile. "Aren't these things supposed to be for getting to know one another? A little prying is fine," he commented, trying and likely failing to put an amused front. "The thing is, I wasn't interested, but today was… I haven't been in a good place for a while, but I've been managing. Today was a great day though. Maybe the best in quite a while. I feel… whole, again. Maybe I'll go back to being a mess tomorrow though, so… Sorry, just in case," he explained as best he could.

Pierce had a feeling that he wasn't being very clear, but then again, he wasn't even sure he knew how he felt and what he was dealing with. His mind and his emotions had been a mess since he… traveled to the Pokemon world, to put it nicely. So, he really wasn't too sure he was even understanding things himself.

"No worries," Daisy reassured him with a soft smile. "I figured some of that out myself. And don't get me wrong, you are a great guy and you look just as good, but I'm not really looking for anything too serious," she admitted, withdrawing a little and showing a hint of nerves. "I hope that's ok."

"I think between the two of us, I'm the one that has the most to worry about, Daisy, really," he waved off and he wondered if she really relaxed a little at that or if he'd imagined that. "Why ask me out though? Now I'm curious."

"Gym Leaders… don't get much time for themselves, for one," she answered with a wry smile as she looked at her wine glass before taking a sip. "On top of that, we are… intimidating for most others, I guess. My sisters and I have it even worse because we are also celebrities, so… Yeah, it's difficult to find someone with whom we can see anything at all happening. I guess you could say that I didn't want to let a chance pass me by, even if I could be wrong."

"Well, hopefully you are not too wrong," he told her with a grin, not at all offended by that. It seemed that, somehow, through completely different situations, they were on the same page. Now that was something to be grateful about. "Hope you are not too mad at me if you are wrong though."

"You are fine. Even if you are a bad date, you have been a nice friend so far," she told him with a joking smile. "I can just friendzone you."

"Oh no, anything but that," Pierce "exclaimed" in "dismay" with a flat expression. "However will I recover?"

"Fairly well, I'd bet," Daise replied and she looked to be having fun. So, he guessed the serious talk hadn't ruined the date. He'd been a little worried about that, quite honestly.

It had been a while since he went out on a date, but he was pretty sure that getting that deep right off the bat wasn't ideal. Then again, he wouldn't know, considering that the date seemed to be going well now that they were away from that topic. Maybe it hadn't been as bad as he feared? He really hoped so. He'd rather have a good time, even if things didn't lead to anything.

And he'd also rather not have to deal with Daisy's sisters if she had a bad time, so there was that too.

"So, in the spirit of seeing how wrong you are," he started, earning a slight giggle from the woman in front of him, which already sounded like victory. She did have a very nice laugh, as it turned out, cliche as it was for him to think that. "How was it to grow up as the oldest of four girls? I was a middle child myself, two brothers."

"A nightmare most of the time and… amazing sometimes, occasionally both at once," she answered with a wide smile despite the start of her statement. "It got better when they stopped being brats though, admittedly," she added with a grin before bringing her glass to her lips.

"What do you mean stopped?" he asked, grinning widely as Daisy choked on her wine.

"That was mean," she accused, glaring at him even though she had a smile on her face. "Mean, but fair. I guess I should say they aren't as bad as they used to be."

"Wow, they were bad," he commented and she shook her head at him.

"What about you? Are all those stories about middle children real?" she asked and he smiled.

He had a feeling the night would go well.

[}-o-{]

Pierce walked down the stairs, yawning and stretching a little. The sound of bare feet followed him as he moved through the house. Despite the hour, he was still tired and sleepy. Alas, he had a day ahead of him, so couldn't just sleep until noon… or more. A shame, truly, but such was life.

"Look who finally woke up," he heard as he stepped inside the dining room. "Were you out for that l…ong?" Misty trailed off, blinking at him. Around the table, Violet and Lily looked up and reacted much like her. They recovered a lot faster though, but not as fast as the remaining sister.

"Not out, no," Daisy said, likely standing on her tiptoes to peek over his shoulder and draping her arms around his neck. "We came back fairly early, didn't we?" the blonde asked him, trying and failing to sound casual as her lips pulled into a smile.

He gave her a side look and weighed his options in his mind.

Ultimately…

"I think so, yeah," he answered, getting a giggle from his date from the previous night. When she let go of him, he moved into the dining room. "Good morning," he greeted as he tried to stave off any embarrassment he might be feeling. Fortunately for him, he was too tired to really feel it full force.

Although, admittedly, Misty's staring was starting to get to him.

"We weren't expecting a guest," Violet commented, looking at her blond sister as she walked around him and towards the table. "And it's Daisy's turn to cook too. She's lucky we didn't wake her up for that."

"Ugh, right, I forgot," Daisy replied with a groan and a grimace. However, that was quickly turned into a much more playful expression. "I'd say you were the lucky ones for not doing that… or maybe unlucky?" she commented, giggling to herself.

Pierce, meanwhile, stood there awkwardly for a moment before deciding that doing something would probably help him feel less uncomfortable.

"Guess I can whip up something for the two of us, if that's ok?"

"I'm not gonna stop you from cooking breakfast for me, handsome. I can tell you that," Daisy answered with a wink. Pierce nodded to that and walked towards the kitchen, which was fortunately within view. As he did, he resolutely looked anywhere but at the other three sisters. He really didn't feel like dealing with that mess at the moment.

'Shouldn't have let her convince me to come here of all places,' he thought to himself with a grimace. Alas, what was done was done and he needed to deal with things as they were. At least he could focus on cooking something to keep his mind preoccupied.

Somehow though, Pierce wasn't feeling too bad.

"Stop looking so happy, damnit," he heard someone grumble and he made the mistake of glancing towards the table where the sisters were seated at. Lily was glaring at Daisy while the blonde just continued beaming while she rested her chin on her palms with her elbows on the table. Misty, for her part, looked… very red in the face. Then there was Violet, who caught his gaze and narrowed her eyes at him.

'Right, just don't look at them,' he told himself, turning back to the breakfast he was preparing. He was no chef, and he usually left cooking for Lily while he prepared food for the pokemon, but if he wasn't very mistaken, he was doing ok for himself. Not like he'd been a particularly shitty cook before and he did have some practice helping Lily and from preparing things for his pokeblocks and poffins.

"Date went well, I take it?" he heard Violet ask and he even more resolutely focused on what he was doing. Alas, no matter how hard he tried, Pierce just couldn't block the sound of their voices from reaching his ears. 'Fuck,' he cursed to himself. He guessed he was cursed to suffer through the morning.

Although, admittedly, the previous night did make up for quite a lot.

"Mhm, was great," he heard Daisy hum. "We had a lot of fun out."

"And then back here, I bet," Violet asked wryly.

"I don't need to hear about that," Misty groaned and he hoped against hope that her complaint would be heard and-

"Oh, look at little Misty! She's acting all shy! Almost like that time when we caught her-"

"That's enough of you," the redhead growled, pointing at Lily – who had been the one talking – with her fork. "Can we just have a normal breakfast?"

"Nope," all three of the Sisters said, making her deflate. Unknown to them, so did Pierce, because that morning was shaping up to be a very awkward one for him. Alas, the price he paid for the great night he had with Daisy, he supposed.

He had honestly not expected to have that good a time. Once the excitement from the show wore off, he'd been more than a little nervous. However, even if it was a date, it didn't need to be all that. He knew Daisy from all the time he spent at the Gym, and he knew they got along. There was no need to be too nervous so long as neither of them did anything stupid.

Which they didn't. In fact, things had gone spectacularly. He'd had such a good time that some of the aforementioned excitement had returned to him. Which, between that and a few drinks they could probably have done without, had led to some… questionable decisions.

Not that he regretted anything and, judging by Daisy's smile when he approached the table with breakfast, neither did his date.

"You are just a gift that keeps on giving, aren't you, Pierce?" Daisy asked.

"I bet he gave you a lo-"

"Violet!" Misty exclaimed, scandalized.

"Lived up to his name, huh?"

"Lily!"

It was still going to be a very awkward morning, indeed.

[}-o-{]

"Not ready for a relationship, was it?" Lily – his traveling companion this time – asked him when they met at the battlegrounds, raising one of her eyebrows at him. "You, mister, are a lying liar," she added, crossing her arms and tapping her foot on the floor. Beside him, he didn't need to check to know that his pokemon – sans Bellatrix, maybe – were having fun at his expense.

"It just kinda happened?" he replied wryly, and somehow she looked even less impressed with that response. As if to drive her point home, she stared very intently at the side of his neck, which prompted him to bring a hand up to cover that particular spot. "What do you want from me, woman?" he asked, because her glare was getting very uncomfortable to bear.

Lily sighed, her annoyed and angry disposition vanishing a little.

"Pierce, you said you weren't ready to be with anyone just like, last week."

"Was it really last-?"

"And now this?" she interrupted him, waving her hand towards his general self. He got what she was trying to say though. Furthermore, the worry he saw in her eyes made him feel awful. "Are you ok?"

"I'm… fine," he answered, slowly. Of course, he knew that it wasn't very reassuring because of that. However, it was the truth, and he was kind of surprised to find that out as he said it. It was… He was fine.

He understood why Lily thought it was confusing and all. He'd half expected to regret things, to feel bad and more confused than he already was on his good days. He was in a foreign world to him, even after all that time. He wasn't from the Pokemon world. The entire place was strange to Pierce, and maybe it would continue to be for the longest time.

However, the previous day, he'd felt different. During the show, he'd been part of that. The staff had worked with him. The gyarados had danced for him. The crowd had watched them perform. His friends had supported him. His team, his family had his back.

Looking at his pokemon beside and behind him, he knelt and pet Andromeda's head with a slight smile.

"I'm fine," he repeated a little more firmly, more meaningfully.

Because the previous day, he hadn't been Pierce Lawson, the displaced, dead man.

He had been Pierce Lawson, pokemon trainer, poketuber and Helper-Voice.

"I just… I think I'm finding my place in this world, I guess," he added then, standing up and turning to give his friend a smile. Lily looked at him… She looked a little worried, but she also looked happy. She was happy that he was getting better, after so long being concerned.

"I'm happy for you, Pierce," she told him, confirming his thoughts. It made his grin widen. "I really am," she continued and he narrowed his eyes because there was definitely something suspicious in her voi- "But really?" she added, her now familiar teasing tone bleeding into her words as she looked pointedly at his neck again.

"Oh, grow up," he grumbled, rolling his eyes. "You'll get your chance with Blue someda-"

"Ew, Pierce!" she spat out, her face scrunched as if she were smelling something foul. "Why? Just, why?"

"Because you are a brat, that's why," he replied, but he was still giving her a fond smile. Because she really was one of the people that he was the most thankful for. Lily had been the first person he'd grown close to in the Pokemon world, and she was likely the one that had anchored him the most to that world. Because his team was awesome and there was no denying that, but they were pokemon. If anything, just them made him feel even more out of place.

Lily though, she was a friend, she was human and she could have just as well have been a friend of his in his old world. She made him realize that he could fit in where he was, in that strange, foreign world. The most incredible part was that she'd done all that without even knowing, just by being herself.

"Just do it already," Cygnus told him and Pierce could almost feel him rolling his eyes at him.

"Pierce?" Lily asked, blinking as he moved closer to her. She opened her mouth to say something but was interrupted when he pulled her into a hug.

"Thank you," he told her, trying to convey how much what she'd done and Lily herself meant to him. "Just, thank you."

"... Don't mention it," he heard her say, her voice muffled against his shoulder as she returned his hug. "That's what friends are for, you know?" she added, squeezing him harder than he did her. He just smiled widely, happy that things were better.

Maybe he wasn't a hundred percent yet. Maybe he'd never be. Maybe the void left by his old life would always be there. However, that day, at that very moment, he thought he could live with that all the same. Pierce thought that maybe, just maybe, he could be whole once more, despite the hole in his heart.

"This doesn't mean I won't tease you over this, just to make that clear," Lily told him and he let out a chuckle that turned into a full blown laugh in but a few seconds.

"Sure thing, Lils. You need all the ammunition you can get anyway," he replied, letting go of her and taking a step back. He kept his hands on the sides of her arms for a single second, squeezing them before fully releasing her.

"Stop calling me that," she hissed. "And I don't need charity, Pierce. You just can't escape this one."

"Whatever helps you sleep at night, Lils," he said, shaking his head and walking around her, his pokemon following after him.

"Pierce!"

[}-o-{]

That afternoon found Pierce sitting at the edge of the Cerulean Gym's pool, absently kicking his feet in the water. Narcissa was the one keeping him company, surprisingly, instead of Andromeda. The vaporeon was training and his pokemon seemed to have decided that someone would stick around at all times, so it was Narcissa's time to latch on his back with her stingers crossed over his neck.

"Come a long way, haven't we?" he mused idly. "And we haven't even gone through three cities," he added somewhat amused. Viridian Forest, Pewter, Mt. Moon, Cerulean. So few places they'd been at and Pierce already felt like a completely different person. "Where will we be in another three months, I wonder."

They weren't quite there though.

Eight-six days, that's how long he'd been in the Pokemon world.

It sounded like a lot and, at the same time, no time at all.

"What did you do to her?" a voice called and he turned a little confused. Briefly, his eyes darted to the side, checking that the shout hadn't disturbed any of the gyarados. "She's been pleasant… All day!" Lily – the Sensational Sister – told him, as if that were some weird happening in the sisters' lives. "It's weird!"

"Is it?" he asked, genuinely confused.

"Flatterer," Violet told him with a half-smile, coming to stand beside her sister. "She has been weirdly happy all day."

"You two are very annoying. Does that help?" Daisy asked, skipping until she was on his side. Even with those words, her expression and voice were all peaceful happiness "How's it going over here?"

"See what I mean?!" Lily exclaimed.

"Great. They are very calm. I think the show might have left them a little tired," he commented with a smile, ignoring the pink-haired sister as best he could. "How are things on your side?"

"Great," she said, mimicking his answer but adding a little… something as she said it. "Battles were fun-"

"She crushed the poor bastards extra hard today," Violet pointed out, but her sister ignored her.

"-And we also went to look over the numbers of the show and such. We are already starting to move that money for the shelters," Daisy continued, seemingly calming down and growing more serious. "With the amount we could gather, what you gathered, plus some donations, we think the shelters should be able to have something temporary ready very soon, at the least."

"That's great to hear," he replied with a nod and a smile. "I'll miss them though, bunch of troublemakers that they are."

"I think that's the first time I've heard gyarados be called that specifically," Daisy said, giggling behind her hand.

"Seriously, did you literally fuck her silly?"

"Lily!" Violet exclaimed, and Pierce took a deep breath in. Idly, he wondered how to best deal with the awkwardness… Until he came to a conclusion, turned towards the pinkette and raised an eyebrow.

"Why? Wanna see how it feels?" he asked with a completely flat expression. 'Might as well make this awkward for everyone involved,' was the decision he made. Lily… Well, her mouth clicked shut, her eyes widened and her expression turned so red it was probably transitioning to maroon already. Behind him, he heard Daisy start laughing uncontrollably and even Violet burst into giggles.

"Wh-But you-I mean-What?" the woman sputtered, very clearly out of it. Unable to stop himself, he took a step closer to her and let a smile form on his face. 'All out, for being mean.'

"Is that a yes?" he asked, and she leaned back without actually stepping away, which was hilarious. Her sisters apparently agreed, because they were still laughing. Hell, he could hear Daisy wheezing as she tried to tell him to stop.

"But-I-You-Daisy?"

"A three-way? Bold, I have to say. With your sister to boot. I didn't know you had it in you, Lily, truly," he said, doing his best to play the shocked part as the poor woman looked like she'd pass out any second. "We can check with Daisy though, I guess. I'm certainly down for that though."

"Ohmygod," Daisy said behind him.

"That's what she said," he commented, a little impressed by how quick that came to him. "A lot," he added with a smirk and Violet and Daisy seemed to double down on the laughter. "So, I haven't heard a no yet, Lily," he pointed out, leaning towards the pinkette who didn't even look like she had it in her to say anything anymore, random sputtering or not.

So, he held her gaze for a long moment… and then he couldn't stop himself anymore and started laughing too. It took a bit for Daisy, Violet and him to calm down, but by the time they did, Lily was pouting full force at them. It honestly almost made him devolve into laughter once more.

Alas, he didn't think that'd go well for him, somehow. He'd pushed his luck plenty as it was, really, he was pretty sure. Maybe he should play it safe from the on. 'Where did all that even come from?' he wondered, feeling embarrassment creeping up in him.

"That was… That was great," Daisy said, wiping a tear from her eye. "I haven't laughed that hard since forever ago."

"Good, Pierce, very good indeed," Violet added, patting him in the back.

He didn't know how to take that though. Sure, it'd been hilarious, but as he looked back on it then and there, he couldn't help but feel very embarrassed. He really didn't know where that had come from. Maybe he'd been feeling extra bold or something but that had evidently been a very short-lived thing. When had been the last time he did something that dumb on a whim?

Probably back in his old world with his friends, he was sure.

"I honestly thought I'd get smacked by someone before I got that far," he admitted with a nervous chuckle. Hell, he'd expected to get slapped as soon as he got started really.

"No no, I wouldn't dare. That was great," Daisy told him, shaking her head. "One of our pokemon would have blasted you way before today if you were even remotely that kind of idiot," she added and he probably should have been more worried or scared than he was at that moment.

"Good to know," he commented.

"Don't think I didn't notice you didn't say no though, Lily."

"Daisy!"

[} Chapter End {]

Hey guys! How's it going?

This chapter was… I don't even know. Characters be doing character things, I guess. At this point, I'm here for the ride as much as you, guys.

So, I hope you enjoyed the chapter.

As always, if you can't wait until next week for next chapter, or if you just feel like supporting my writing, there's up to three new chapters in my Pa tre on:

P a treon . com (slash) AdrianKing

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Random Question: When's the last time you got sick? What was it? I've had a sore throat and a runny nose for like a week by now. It sucks.

See you.