Moments Through an Hourglass (Silver/Lyra, for ainbthech)

[pokepromptsmods]

Title: moments through an hourglass
Rating: PG-13-ish?
Verse: Games, Generation II
Characters/Pairings: Kotone/Silver, some Silver/Green, strongly hinted Red/Green, Professor Oak, mentions of lots of other characters.
Summary: For three years, Kotone writes and Silver waits and Green listens.
Notes: Written for ainbthech, who requested something along the lines of Kotone/Silver, in a long distance relationship, writing letters to each other, preferably with negotiated non-monogamy, Green, Cynthia, pokemon/vegan rights, or gender role angst. I didn't get all of that in there, but I did try to get as much of them as I could in there. I hope you have no problems with the Silver/Green angle and that you like this! ♥


I'm at this island, Kotone writes. Well, islands- there's this kind of big one, where I'm on, and then there's these two smaller ones near it. The people here are really friendly. They worship this sea-god thing, though, and I think...well, I think it might be Lugia. I didn't say anything to them, of course- I mean, I don't want to tell them that I caught their god!

It is Pidgeot who brings this letter. It's Tuesday, so Silver's training in the Dragon's Den and it is there the bird pokémon brings it. Its feathers are ruffled and the pokémon itself is disgruntled from having to fend off the various Dratini and Magikarp that accosted it on the way in. Silver pats the Pidgeot's head absently, reading through the rather lengthy letter- this time Kotone has written four pages, front and back, and a little more on a fifth page.

He folds the letter up when he's finished, and turns towards Gengar. "Back to work," he says brusquely, when his hand is suddenly assaulted by Pidgeot's beak. He jumps back, glaring at it. "What was that for, you stupid bird?" he hisses, cradling his injured hand.

Pidgeot looks pointedly at the letter still in his hand, then lifts its leg, gesturing with its wing. Pidgeot looks rather absurd like this, balancing precariously on one leg and flapping its wings about, and Gengar snickers. Pidgeot glares and squawks at it, settling down in a more dignified position, its head held high.

Silver makes an exasperated sound, and unfolds the letter, tearing a blank strip from the last, mostly empty page. He heads for his bag- Pidgeot's bothered him enough times for him to learn to always have a pen in there, just in case- and scribbles a hasty note. Tell your Pidgeot to have more patience, he writes, and he hands it to the bird pokémon with a scowl.

Pidgeot takes it with a soft croon- a marked difference from its earlier assault- and rises in the air, flapping away. Soon enough Silver can hear it screeching at the inhabitants of the Dragon's Den, the sound echoing against the cave walls. Soon enough, even that fades, and the air settles quiet, thick, stifling around him.

Gengar gives him a questioning look, but Silver turns away to look across the water. An unfortunate Dratini pops its head up out of the water only a moment later, and he points at it with his free hand.

"Shadow Ball," he orders, the letter crinkled tight in his hands.

I'll be leaving this island tomorrow, she writes a little over a month later. The people here told me that there's another one about two days from here, so I'll be going there next. Everyone here is so nice, it's sad to leave them. But I've been here for long enough, I think. The woman I'm staying with was even nice enough to lend me her Wingull so Pidgeot can be all rested and then I can leave sooner! I hope you're doing okay...

It's Saturday, early morning, so Silver is at home in his apartment eating breakfast when the Wingull comes pecking at his window. The pokémon is strange to him, but Silver's used to the wide variety of Flying types Kotone manages to borrow on her journeys, so he ignores it, mostly. This letter is short, only half a page, but by the time he finishes scanning through it the Wingull is already gone, not even stopping to rest.

He allows a moment of grudging admiration for the hardiness of the bird pokémon, then looks over the view outside his window- familiar buildings gleaming in the morning sun. He turns back to his pokémon, then, and all six of them are looking at him curiously, their breakfasts temporarily ignored.

"What are you looking at?" he asks with a scowl, but there's no real malice in his voice. They return to their food- Feraligatr and Crobat looking at him a moment longer than the rest- and he dumps the remainder of his food on their plates, no longer hungry.

When they finish, he returns them to their pokéballs, all but Crobat, who insists on staying out with him despite the daylight. He leaves the apartment and Crobat follows, hovering over his shoulder.

He doesn't have anywhere to go, so he just walks, taking in the sights and sounds of Viridian he's seen a hundred times. When he was younger, he thought he'd never come back to Viridian, not unless Giovanni came back and he could go after him, but now he is here, in the city where he grew up, and just as restless as he was when he left.

He wants to train, but he's been training all week and his pokémon are tired. They deserve the rest, even though his blood is stirring with the restless need to do something.

He turns the corner abruptly, increasing the speed of his steps, and Crobat flutters after him with worry in its beady eyes.

...but then I found out something terrible! Kotone writes the next time he gets a letter. Did you know that they still eat Farfetch'd here? It's horrible! Some of the people here don't like me very much anymore because of it, but I can't just watch! At least the person I'm staying with is very nice. He has a daughter, about the age we were when we started traveling Johto, and she likes the Farfetch'd lots. She follows me everywhere, and it's so cute!

"Mind if I sit here?"

Silver looks up, styrofoam cup halfway to his mouth. The cafe-shop-place he's in- he's not entirely sure what you would call it- has filled up when he wasn't looking, the voices of the people around him growing to a steady hum. The person speaking stands before him, holding his own cup in his hands. Silver recognizes him, although he's only seen him in passing before- the leader of the Viridian Gym.

"Go ahead," he says, taking a gulp of the steaming hot chocolate, with just enough milk added to give it a coffee-like shade. He flips through the pages of Kotone's letter, absentmindedly scanning the lines as Green takes a seat.

He feels eyes on him, and looks up again to see Green watching him. "What?" he demands with a scowl. He moves to take another gulp of his drink.

Green shrugs. "Nothing, really. I was just wondering if that letter was from your girlfriend."

Silver turns bright red, and hot chocolate goes everywhere- up his nose, on the table, down his lungs. Green moves as if to stand- to get napkins, to pat him on the back, Silver doesn't know, but he waves at him to stay there between hacking coughs, and Green sits.

He sops up the mess with extra napkins once he's not half-dying anymore. Green thoughtfully waits for him to return from throwing away the sodding mess before he speaks again.

"So, was that a yes?"

Something interesting happened to me the other day, Kotone writes. You know how I've been keeping an eye on the Farfetch'd, right? Well, one of them followed me home! She's so cute! She likes to snuggle and she's really playful and I think she's in love with you. At least, she's in love with your picture. She's always stealing it from me- I think it's the red hair, personally, since she's always tugging at the hair of that girl I told you about, the one who follows me around.

"Hot?"

Silver looks up with a frown. Green stands before him, hands tucked into the pockets of his coat. His breath puffs around his face as he speaks. "You look pretty flushed there," he says with a smirk.

Silver turns an even brighter red, spluttering out protests. Green laughs. "Calm down," he says. "You don't need to explain yourself to me." He pauses, just long enough for Silver to get comfortable in the silence. "So, who's your girlfriend? Do I know her?" He waggles his eyebrows at Silver, looking rather silly.

Silver crosses his arms, mouth set in another ill-tempered frown. "Kotone," he says, almost reluctantly.

Green looks surprised. "The Champion?" he asks, and Silver nods. "I haven't heard from her in a while. What's she doing now?"

Silver looks away as he replies. "Traveling," he says, and he misses the way Green's eyes soften in understanding.

She was restless, always restless- traveling through Johto and Kanto had awakened something dormant in her blood, something that forced her to always yearn to see more more more.

She had been apologetic when she told him. "I'm sorry," she had said. "I just have to. Maybe I'll even do some good out there- take down another Team Rocket or something." She had smiled a half-smile when she said that. "And I'll write lots, I promise."

And then she left.

This will be my last day here, Kotone writes. I've started something, I think. There's a group of people here now arguing against hunting the Farfetch'd- mostly the younger generation, but some of the older ones too. I think they can do it. I know that I'll do more harm than good, now- I think the ones for hunting Farfetch'd might listen to their friends and neighbors, but they nearly go into an apoplectic fit every time they see me, so. I'm not entirely sure where I'm going to go next from here, though I have heard...

Feraligatr is watching him when he looks up. It's Thursday, so they're in the Dragon's Den, training. Or, at least, they were until Kotone's Pidgeot swooped in a half an hour before, with much less screeching than usual- the pokémon in the caves are slowly becoming used to the intruder- carrying a letter in its talons.

Silver looks at the letter, than back at Feraligatr. "Let's go back," he says, finally, and recalls it to its pokéballs.

The Fly back to Kanto isn't short by any means, but one he's used to by now. Two hours later and he's in Viridian again, and Green is there as well, leaning against his apartment door, his cheeks red from cold. There's an Eevee perched on his shoulder, swaying its tail back and forth.

"Hey," he says, raising a hand in greeting. "I'd say nice place, but I can't see it from here."

Silver recalls Crobat to its pokéball, putting it back on his belt. "What are you doing here?" he asks not-so pleasantly.

Green has the grace to look embarrassed. "I made Salma mad and she stole my keys, and now I'm locked out of my gym. And my apartment. And I need somewhere to stay the night."

Silver doesn't quite know what to say to that- he always thought he was the only one cursed with such terrible luck- so instead he blurts out the first thing that comes to mind. "How do you know where I live?"

Green blinks. "Phonebook. Most Pokémon Centers have them."

Silver stares. Finally, he says, "Don't you have any friends you can ask?"

The Eevee glares and makes a sound similar to a hiss, if Eevees can even hiss. Green just looks at him. "They're traveling," he says.

Silver unlocks the door.

Silver makes them coffee. It's Magneton's turn out of the pokéball, and it hovers behind Silver's head with a steady hum. Eevee keeps an eye on it, a curious expression on her face, while Green just watches as they move around the kitchen. He accepts his cup with a silent nod of thanks, and sips at it, once. He sets it on the table, wrapping his cold-chapped hands around the cup. Silver does similarly, inwardly grimacing at the taste and he silently wishes for the instant hot chocolate packages hidden away behind the empty pickle jars in his cabinets.

"How's your girlfriend?" Green asks, for lack of anything better to say. His eyes linger on the sheaf of papers left haphazardly by the rarely-used coffee maker.

"Off saving innocent Farfetch'd from being eaten," he answers, dryly. He takes another sip of the bitter drink and tries to not choke on it.

Green looks startled. "Are you being serious?" At Silver's nod his face wrinkles up with disgust. "Who would eat a pokémon?"

Silver shrugs and remembers, oddly enough, Slowpoke tails.

They end up watching old westerns half the night, snickering at the cheesy lines and pretending to not notice the other tear up when the main character or his lady love or his best friend or his Ponyta/Growlithe die a melodramatic death.

I'm in Sinnoh now, Kotone writes. I know, I know, weird after all that island hopping that I've been doing. Anyways, I ran into the former champion by complete accident! Her name is Cynthia, and she's really cool and she knows a whole bunch about everything I swear! I met the Champion too, a few days later. She's really sweet, but she definitely doesn't look as tough as Cynthia says she is. She's all delicate and pretty-looking, like a doll.

"That pretty? Maybe I should visit Sinnoh on my next vacation," Green comments.

"Get off," Silver grumbles, pushing Green's arm off his shoulders and stepping away. "And stop reading my letters."

Silver's still not sure when he ever agreed to this, but after that night Green started to swing by his apartment at least once a week for coffee and movies. During the week, Silver still trains at the Dragon's Den, but Green still battles challengers at the gym anyways. Eevee still hates him, for some reason Silver can't decipher, but she likes his pokémon well enough so it all works out. And somehow, despite the coffee and Eevee's glares and the fact he never allowed it, Silver finds himself almost looking forward to his visits. Almost.

That didn't mean he'll let him read Kotone's letters, though.

"How did you meet her?" Green asks suddenly, later that evening. He's curled up on the couch, coffee cup half-full in his hands, Eevee perched all puffy-like on the couch arm nearest to him. Silver turns away from the VCR, scowl pre-equipped.

"Who," he asks, although he's pretty sure he knows.

"Kotone."

Silver turns back to fumbling with the VCR, taking the last movie they watched out and replacing it with the next one on the shelf. Green waits. Finally, Silver replies. "She was my rival."

"Figures." There's something so bitter in his voice that it forces Silver to turn around, to look at him. He feels like he should say something, but he doesn't know what- it was Kotone who was always good at this sort of thing, not him. Eevee's looking at him too, all worry.

"What do you mean?" Silver finally asks, and it comes out a bit more defensively than he would like.

"I have- had- have a rival too," Green says, staring off into the distance. "Do you know who Red is?"

Silver nods- he remembers Kotone telling him about the trainer on Mount Silver, a trainer she hasn't managed to beat quite yet, her eyes sparkling and round with admiration, her voice hushed with awe.

Green continues, and Silver's not quite sure if he even saw him. "He's my best friend. We grew up together. Started our journeys at the same time. I could never beat him." He looks over at Silver again, then.

Silver doesn't know what to say- not when he sees himself looking at him from the couch- so all that comes out is, "I couldn't beat Kotone either."

Green nods, then pushes play.

Silver mentions this thing he's tentatively calling a friendship with Green in his next letter to Kotone, and her reply is almost immediate, sent to him by something that looks like a Togepi with wings.

It's a Monday, so he's in the Dragon's Den when the letter comes. By now his pokémon are completely used to the interruptions- they've been dealing with them for well over a year now, anyways- so Crobat just gets itself comfortable on Silver's head once the pokémon appears. Silver grumbles and shoves at it but his motions are half-hearted as he's already reading through what she wrote. It was written in a hurry, he can see, her words running into each other and some of the letters only half-formed.

You're hanging out with Green? That's great! she writes. I've always thought that you two would get along pretty well with each other, it looks like I was right! And hey! Green is pretty cute. You should try to seduce him! =P

He turns red and splutters around a bit when he reads this, despite the fact that only the Crobat still attached to his head can hear him. He knew that they had agreed that they could both have relationships outside of each other- Kotone had never been the jealous type and he couldn't help but see her as belonging to the entire world- but he also never expected her to actually encourage him to seduce someone!

The idea doesn't leave his mind, though, and the next time Green visits Silver spends the entire time bright red and unable to meet his eyes. Eevee stares at him like she knows what he's thinking and his Feraligatr gives him sympathetic looks, but Green seems to be completely oblivious.

"What's wrong?" Green even asks at one point, and Silver can only splutter not-very-convincing denials that make Green raise a skeptical eyebrow at him.

He blames Kotone, but not even his very eloquent letter to her- I hate you so much- can deter her from the idea. The letter she sends in reply is full of seduction tips, and he groans and bangs his head against the cave wall until Alakazam steps in and stops him.

But in the end, for all his confusion and worrying, it is not Silver who does the seducing. It's just another night on Silver's couch and just another movie, but when the desperado kidnaps the main character's lady love, Green turns towards Silver and kisses him, suddenly, fiercely.

A moment later he pulls back, already apologizing, but Silver just snarls at him to shut up and kiss him again. And he does.

(The explaining of his open relationship with Kotone is much less pleasant, and Silver has to go through much embarrassment and blushing and spluttering about before he thinks about showing Green Kotone's letters. After that Green has no complaints, but the teasing goes on for months.)

Green spends more time at Silver's apartment after that, coming by more frequently and staying the night more often. Silver still hasn't run out of different movies for them to watch- something Green is a little in awe about- but they also spend less time watching movies and more time doing other things, like wandering the city together or trying (and failing) to make dinner in Silver's kitchen. (And Silver will forever maintain that it was all Green's fault because parsley never blows up like that when he's handling it.)

They're more similar than Silver would have thought. They both act tougher than they really are and have rivals that they have never defeated. They both like to drink hot chocolate and pretend it's coffee- something Silver nearly murders Green over, the day Green confesses that he hates coffee and he realizes that he's been drinking it for nothing all these months- and most definitely do not have a secret weakness for cheesy westerns. They both have the worst luck known to man, and are always, always waiting.

Green tells him a little more about Red one night when they're laying there in bed- about how he was Champion for five minutes, just about, and how Red disappeared one day and it took him a year to find him and how no matter what he says or does Red will not come down, and how sometimes he thinks Red is just waiting to be defeated, somehow, some way.

And Silver finds himself telling him about his father. Not who he was, but what he did- how he left him, mostly, and how he was so weak. His fists still clench as he speaks, and his blood still boils in his veins. He still wants to scream at him, demand whywhywhy? He hasn't forgiven him, not yet, not by a long shot, and he doesn't know if he ever will.

When he finishes, Green asks, quietly, "Why did he leave?"

Silver thinks about saying, because your best friend defeated him and then you took his gym, but instead he stays quiet and stares up at the ceiling.

The next time Green spends the night, they go up the roof of the building and sit there for half the night, looking over the city and how the lights peppered the night sky, like hundreds of little stars.

They fall into a pattern or sorts. Silver still goes to the Dragon's Den to train, but he leaves early and goes to the gym first before he heads home. Green's trainers begin to know him on sight, and he realizes just how good of a trainer Green is. Then they head off, to his apartment or wherever they feel like.

They end up going to the cafe where they met quite a bit. The hot chocolate there is better than anywhere else, and it's not long before all the workers there know them and their usual order by heart. And as they leave, every single time, Green presses a quick kiss to Silver's lips and grins as he blushes and splutters and scowls at him. And Silver finds himself wondering why oh why does he always go for people fond of public displays of affection?

Kotone's letters still come regularly. She's traveling through Sinnoh with Cynthia, and her letters now are filled with bits and pieces of historical trivia from all the places she goes to courtesy of the former Champion- places Silver has never been.

He pushes those thoughts away and puts those letters away with all the others.

This thing he has with Green eventually ends, as most things do. It ends quietly, with a whimper instead of a bang, slowly dying over the stretch of months until one day he wakes up and realizes that it's done. Green agrees, to his relief, and that's that.

For a bit, Silver- well, he doesn't worry, because Silver never worries, but he does experience a brief twinge of concern that Green might not come back or that things will be weird between them if he does. But then Green appears on his doorstep that following Friday demanding his hot chocolate like nothing has changed and Eevee glares at him the same way she always has and Silver can breathe again.

I'm going to Hoenn, Kotone writes in one of her shorter letters. Cynthia is coming too. She was the one who suggested it, actually, since we've gone through almost all of Sinnoh together. I don't know much about Hoenn, but I didn't know much about Sinnoh either, and that was fun too. It should be interesting, I think.

"I figured you would be here."

Silver doesn't bother to look up as Green plops himself in his usual chair, his eyes still on Kotone's letter. Green being there doesn't bother him. However, he does mind when Green reaches over and snags his cup of hot chocolate for himself. Then Silver looks up, scowling.

"Buy your own," he says, brushing away some hair that falls into his eyes. "And stop stealing mine."

"No. Yours tastes better," Green replies.

"They come from the same place," Silver points out. "Give it back."

"No," Green refuses, and he tilts his head back as he drains the last of the hot chocolate from the styrofoam cup.

"I hate you," Silver informs him. "And you're buying me another one."

"Right, right, sure," Green agrees, brushing it all away with a wave of the hand that Silver's sure means that he'll forget about his promise before he even gets up out of his seat. "Anyways, there's something that I need to talk to you about."

"What?" Silver asks, suspicious after the theft of his drink. He narrows his eyes.

Green looks a little uncomfortable now, though Silver's pretty sure it has nothing to do with him suddenly feeling regret over his crime. "I talked to Gramps the other day," he says in an inadvertent confirmation of Silver's thoughts.

Silver gives him a look that clearly states, You are an idiot and I have no idea what you're talking about. But all he says is, "Who?"

"Gramps," Green repeats. "My grandfather. You've probably heard of him. Professor Oak." He sounds tired instead of proud, and although Silver still doesn't know what he's getting at this, at least, is familiar to him.

"I've heard of him," is all he says, however.

Green nods, then distractedly runs a hand through his hair, sending the spikes in disarray. "He's been doing research on Dragon types recently, he told me. But he can only study the pokémon in his lab, since there are no real colonies of Dragon types around here and he has other responsibilities that keep him near to home." He pauses. Silver doesn't speak. "Anyways, I thought of you, and how you're always away training at the Dragon's Den, and I thought that maybe you'd be interested in collecting data for him. Of the Dragon types. In their natural environment." He pauses again. "He'll probably pay you for it."

Silver stares. "You want me. To work for your grandfather."

Green sets the empty styrofoam cup down, finally. "Yeah. If you want to, that is."

Silver thinks about the irony of this- being asked to help out a professor when his journey originally began with him stealing from another one. But he also has Elm's forgiveness along with his once-Totodile, and he thinks that might just count for something too.

He exhales. "I'll try it out," he says, finally. "But you still owe me a drink."

"It won't be much trouble," Oak assures him when he and Green come to visit him the next day. "All I need you to do is observe. Watch what they do. Note their behaviors, their habits, anything you find strange or interesting. That's all there is to it. And don't leave anything out because you think it's obvious. Even a world-renowned professor like me doesn't know everything!" He chuckles, then, and Silver wonders if he missed a joke.

Oak isn't quite what he expected him to be. When they first arrived, he admired Silver's Crobat first thing, and complimented him on treating it with such love, a comment that made him shift from foot to foot guiltily. He then made an offhand comment about it being a while since Green had visited- Green had looked to the side, hands in his coat pockets, and didn't reply- and invited them inside. And before he knew it Silver was seated at a table besides Green, and Professor Oak was going on about what he's asking from him.

"Where's Daisy?" Green asks, once Oak stops talking.

"She's shopping in Celadon City," Oak says. He pauses. "She'll be sorry that she missed you."

Green shrugs uncomfortably, tearing at a piece of bread. Silver takes another bite of his food.

Oak turns back towards him. "What pokémon do you usually see in the Dragon's Den?" he asks him, smiling blandly.

Silver shrugs. "Dratini. Magikarp. There's some Dragonair too, but less of them. I've only seen a Dragonite once." He lost that battle too, and his pokémon had been unusually quiet that night as they huddled around the campfire.

Oak nods, and they eat in silence for a little longer.

"Did Daisy plant some new flowers?" Green asks a little while later. There are crumbs all over his plate, and the pile is growing.

Oak frowns at the mess. "She put those in last spring," he says.

"Oh."

Silence again.

"What pokémon did you start with?" Oaks asks Silver a little while later, just before they all choke on the silence.

"Totodile," Silver answers. He shifts uncomfortably in his chair.

"Elm?"

Silver nods, and prays he doesn't ask any more questions about it. He can just imagine how that conversation would go.

Green stands up then, suddenly, before Oak can ask another question. "We should be going," he says. "I promised Bonita that I would only be away for a few hours." The lie slips seamlessly from his lips- Silver would believe him if he didn't know that Green always takes Saturdays off.

Oak nods, distractedly. "Take care of yourselves, then, both of you," he says. "And stop by again."

Green makes a promise that sounds half-hearted at best, and then they leave.

"What was that about?" Siler demands when they land back in Viridian. The sky is already growing dark, night coming earlier now that the weather is growing colder.

Green doesn't meet his eyes. "What do you mean?"

Silver just looks at him.

Green takes a shaky breath, runs his hand through his hair. "We fought a lot when I was younger, Gramps and me," he says, finally. "I...was a bit of a brat, and then he always preferred Red over me and I couldn't forgive him for that. So we clashed." He exhales. "Things are still a little awkward between us because of that, unless Daisy or Leaf is there to break the ice."

Silver can't really say anything to that, so instead he grumbles that he could have warned him and that Green owes him two drinks now so he'd better pay up soon.

He trains less now when he's at the Dragon's Den, although he still trains, and spends more time watching. Crobat keeps him company when he's sitting down there, watching, although Silver can do without having a bat wrapped around his head. He watches the Dratini and Dragonair frolic in the water, the Dratini more playful and Dragonair more elegant. He watches how the Dratini shed their skin as they grow and how the crystals on the Dragonair's neck and tail glow before it rains. He sees all this and more, and he goes to Pallet Town once a week to give Oak his reports.

Kotone's Pidgeot brings a letter to him one week, a marked difference from the Togepi-like one that has been bringing the letters the last few months, and it almost breaks its neck in its impatience to get through the window. Gengar snickers at it, and the Pidgeot glares back before handing the letter over to Silver. He ignores their bickering and reads.

Cynthia left yesterday, Kotone writes. She got a call from Dawn- that's the girl who's Champion of Sinnoh now, the girl I told you about. Anyways, I don't know what she said, but it must have been important, because Cynthia left for Sinnoh only an hour later. It feels kind of weird, her not being here. I've gotten pretty used to her being around. But don't worry! I'm doing just fine.

The letter goes on about where she's been since her last letter and where she's planning to go next. Silver frowns at it- there's something off about it, despite all the exclamation marks she uses- but he's not sure what it is. Before he can think on it he hears the sound of plates crashing to the ground, and he has to go break up Pidgeot and Gengar before they break something valuable. And the letter lies there on the counter, half-forgotten.

Silver leans against his kitchen wall, watching as Green raids his refrigerator for the hundredth time. "Buy your own food," he grumbles, a little half-heartedly, crossing his arms.

"Your food tastes better than mine," Green mumbles through a mouthful of doughnut, then swallows. Silver briefly considers banging his head against the wall at the overused excuse, but decides that it might really not help.

"How's the data-research-thing with Gramps going?" Green asks in a poor attempt to distract him from his crime, and shoves another one of Silver's mini-doughnuts in his mouth.

"Fine," Silver says, flatly, deciding that it's no use trying to argue with him. Green somehow manages to win every time anyways, no matter what he says or tries. "We're discussing the possibility of Dragonair actually being able to change the weather, instead of just predicting it. Of course, we first have to prove that the glowing of their crystals has anything to do with the weather in the first place, but the evidence shows-" He stops mid-sentence upon noticing the look Green is giving him, the doughnuts all but ignored now.

"What?" he snaps, scowling. "What is it?"

"Nothing," Green says, voice thick with amusement. "You just sounded so into it, like you were a researcher yourself, not just someone asked to gather data for them. Babbling on about theories and evidence- " he shakes his head, bemused.

Silver actually stops to think about this for a moment instead of telling Green he's an idiot right off the bat. It is true that he's been spending more and more time at the lab instead of heading straight home. And it's also true that he doesn't necessarily have to discuss the various theories with Professor Oak as much as he does. But...

"I'm a trainer!" he hisses.

Green shrugs, unperturbed. "Who ever said you can't be both?" he asks.

"There hasn't been a letter for over a month," Silver says one day, staring in the chocolately depths of his mug.

They're at his apartment this time, and Green is actually invited this time instead of him inviting himself. Eevee's in the living room with Magneton, so it's just them there, sitting at the kitchen counter.

There's a bitter edge to Silver's mouth. "She was in Hoenn, the last time she wrote," he adds. "I don't know where she is now." And that’s the whole crux of the problem. He doesn't know anything, can't do anything. He's absolutely useless, and he hates it more than anything.

He doesn't say all of this to Green. It feels weird enough as it is, confiding so much to anyone. But Green makes it easier by not speaking, just sitting there and listening.

He shakes his head when Silver is done. "That's typical behavior for Leaf," he says. "She'll leave for months and months on end without even a single postcard, and then she'll pop up out of nowhere one day and demand that I buy her lunch." He pauses, and the fond look fades. "But Kotone's not Leaf."

"No," Silver says, staring into the swirl of melted marshmallows. "She's not."

"I don't know where she is or why she's not writing," Green finally says. "But sometimes, you just have to wait."

Somehow, Silver understands that he's not just talking about Kotone anymore.

Oak stares at him from across the table, his hands clasped together. Distantly, he can hear the sounds of running water, and Daisy's cheerful voice versus Green's grumbling as they do the dishes in the other room. He's still vaguely surprised that Green bothered to come at all- he had mumbled something about a promise to his sister when he had asked- but at the moment he's more preoccupied with wondering what it is that Professor Oak wants.

"You've been of great help to me with my research," Oak finally says. "I hope you know that I appreciate that."

Silver nods, awkwardly, and finds himself wishing that a giant Snorlax would pop up from the floor and eat him alive.

Oak nods to himself as well, once. "I'll get to the point. Silver, I'd like to ask you to be one of my assistant researchers."

Silver's suddenly grateful that he's not drinking anything, or else he might have made a scene similar to that when he and Green first met. As things stand, he just stares, mouth and throat suddenly dry.

Oak waits.

"I need to think about it," he finally says, and it comes out much more demanding than he would have liked.

Oak gives him a measuring look, then nods. "Take your time," he says.

Silver's leaving Professor Oak's lab a week later when it happens. All he gets is a glimpse of brown feathers before there's this thing in his face and there's this sharp pain as it tries to pull his hair out of his scalp and he's not entirely sure he can breathe. He makes a noise that is most definitely not a squawk and is fighting to get a grip on whatever it is attacking him when he's suddenly aware of the sound of someone laughing. He freezes, his hand clamped around that thing's tail feathers.

"Farfetch'd, that's enough, come back," the voice says, and the thing obeys, letting go and fluttering to the ground. It is a Farfetch'd, he can see now that it's on the ground and not trying to eat his face. It hops away and he lifts his gaze in the direction it's moving towards.

"Hello, Silver," Kotone says, smiling brightly at him. "Green said that I'd find you here." The Farfetch'd reaches her, and she kneels down so it can hop into her arms before straightening up again.

"What are you doing here?" Silver asks, a bit more harshly than he intends. Inwardly, he winces.

She tilts her head. "I missed you," she says. "I was going to come back sooner, but Hoenn gets some pretty bad storms, and I didn't want to send my pokémon out in there." She pauses.

"And the Farfetch'd?" he asks, crossing his arms. She laughs.

"I told you he likes your hair," she says, and he remembers, suddenly, the Farfetch'd who she had written about in her letters nearly three years before. It's such a distant memory, and that, more than anything, drives in how long she's been away.

"When will you leave again?" he asks, abruptly, sharply, and she shrugs, lightly, like she doesn't understand the weight of the question.

"I don't know," she says. "Not for a while, I don't think." And then she looks up into his eyes, and there's no questioning her understanding.

A moment later that's all gone, and she smiles, like a thousand suns. "It's been a while," she says with a laugh. "We have a lot to catch up on. Come on, let's go on a date."

She gets a picnic basket off of Daisy- the other girl is more enthusiastic to help than usual when she finds out what it's for- and then she drags Silver out to the shoreline. He lets Sneasel out of its pokéball when they get there, and the Farfetch'd immediately begins chasing the other pokémon around, fascinated by the reddish-pink feathers.

Kotone keeps up a steady stream of conversation as they eat. "I was worried about you when I left, you know," she says after a lull in the conversation. "I thought you'll either spend your days training yourself to death or sitting around and moping." Silver concentrates very hard on eating his sandwich. It doesn't hide his guilty flush.

"I'm glad you didn't," she says. She pauses, looks up at him. "Green mentioned that you've been helping out Professor Oak?"

Silver nods. "He offered me a job. As an assistant researcher." He hasn't told Green yet, didn't even intend to tell Kotone. But she's sitting right there besides, legs folded under her, and she's smiling up at him and it slips out, just like that.

"What did you say?" she asks, tilting her head to the side.

"I don't know," he says, and it comes out frustrated, annoyed.

She places her hand over his, and he looks away, face flushed. "Don't worry about it," she says, gently. "You'll make the right choice, no matter what you choose."

Kotone sits besides Silver as the sun begins to sink into the horizon, watching the waves, stained red and yellow by the sun's dying light. "I'm sorry," she says, breaking the easy silence. She puts her head on his shoulder, leaning against him. "I'm sorry."

He doesn't reply, but his shoulders relax a little under her weight, and she closes her eyes.

Later, the sky grows dark, and it is moonlight reflecting off of the waves, not sunlight. They're on their feet, recalling their pokémon and gathering up their things. When she's done, Kotone walks over to Silver, and looks up at him, smiling.

"Let's go home," she says, and takes his hand in hers.