[fanfic] stray italian greyhound
Title: stray italian greyhound
Fandom: Pokémon
Summary: This feeling calls for everything that Silver is not, so he gradually learns to become what he isn't.
Rating: PG
Genre: Friendship, Family, Humor, Romance, Fluff.
Warnings: None.
Notes: For solarpillar, who wanted a "cute, but not mushy" fanfic to be distracted by serve as fuel to burn off pre-finals anxiety... Hopefully this fits the bill. Inspired by and named for the Vienna Teng song, which struck me as the quintessential post-tsun!Silver right when the "dere" is inevitably eminent.
The sudden burst of sunlight makes his eyes hurt. Accustomed as they are to the darkness of the Dragon's Den, he can't help but worry that he'll go blind from the trauma his kidnapper has just subjected his retinas to.
"Isn't it a beautiful day?" Kotone asks cheerfully.
Silver's eyes are closed against the pain, but he grunts his affirmation anyway. The soft hand wrapped around his squeezes, and he can feel warmth of her skin begin to seep through the worn leather of his gloves.
"Aren't you glad you listened to me? If you hadn't you'd still be stuck in that gloomy cave, after all!"
No, Silver wants to say. I wish I hadn't.
The truth is that he would much rather be stuck in his "gloomy cave." Despite that he had done his fair share of it, he has never been too enamored with traveling. When given the choice, he prefers his surroundings to remain static. Dragon's Den may not be home, but it has enough of what he needs at the moment to serve as an extended rest stop - wild pokémon that are still strong enough to pose a challenge, relatively clean water to drink and bathe in, a steady source of income from the pitifully weak novice trainers hoping to pass the Dragon User's challenge….
The place has it all, really. Who cares if it's dark and gloomy? Maybe he even prefers it that way.
So he definitely doesn't need Miss Goody-Goody Two-Shoes to break his routine, especially if it's to indulge her fanciful whims:
Silver, don't you think this ice cream is ah-ma-zing?
Or:
Silver, come help me pick out a new hat!
And, worst of all:
Hibiki and I want to hang out with you, that's all!
Cruelly, that's the excuse she's using today.
The thing is that Silver cannot stomach the idea of doing anything simply for the sake of doing it. He tries giving purpose to everything he does by questioning if it was relevant to his goals. If it was - if it would help make him stronger - he would do it; if not, he would not. It's that simple.
Still, Kotone has a way of making him do the things he doesn't want to. It's infuriating, and Silver doesn't like it one bit, but he's learned to just go with it.
So he doesn't voice his thoughts. He does frown though, the downward twist of his lips belying the light flush the sun has lent his pale cheeks.
What can he say? Old habits die hard.
Her fingers ghost over his cheeks, and Silver jerks back blindly, startled.
"You sure do burn easy!" Kotone points out.
Impossibly, more color floods his cheeks, the bridge of his nose, his neck.
"S-shut up."
She giggles and tugs at his hand.
Well, at least some old habits do.
- . . . -
Kotone is enough to handle on her own, so it's just too much to handle when she drags her freaky brain twin along.
Hibiki is cheerful and loud and insists on touching everything. Usually (thankfully) it's Kotone - the honey-brown ends of her hair, the brim of her ridiculous mushroom hat, her extremely ticklish sides - but sometimes, and with increasing frequency, it's Silver he touches - the dulled crimson of his ends, the calloused skin of his palms, the threadbare laces of his sneakers.
It's enough to drive him crazy.
"Your hair's really dry," Hibiki hums as they wait for the waitress to bring them their orders. "You should really do something about it."
Silver slaps his hands away from his hair and scowls at him through his bangs.
"I'm not going to waste my hard-earned money on that stupid shampoo and conditioner you use," he snaps scathingly in an effort to insult the other boy's manhood.
But Hibiki just continues to smile, nonplussed. From across the table, Kotone laughs and slurps at her soft drink - a disgustingly pink concoction that fizzles with seemingly inexhaustible effervescence.
They are sitting at a booth in one of Goldenrod City's many diner-joints. Silver has reached the conclusion they're all the same, but Kotone and Hibiki insist that this one is the very best. Though he can't detect the difference between the grease-soaked fries and overwhelmingly sweet milkshakes (not to mention the lackluster service) those dumps dish out, he humors them and only grumbles about the distance they have to walk to reach the damn restaurant.
"I still don't see why you idiots make me walk all the way over to this place," he grouses.
"It's about the environment, Silv," Kotone reminds him for what must be the umpteenth time. "You know, the ambiance."
Beside him, Hibiki nods his agreement rather vigorously.
"Yeah! I mean, where else can you find a place that's been decked out wall-to-wall in stuff from the 50s?"
"I know, right?" Kotone exclaims.
They beam at each other, and Silver feels the creaky cushions under his ass shift as Hibiki extends his leg to touch Kotone's foot with his own.
"Why do you two drag me along on your dates?" Silver groans, covering his aching eyes with his hand.
There is silence for a few moments before Kotone speaks.
"I never thought of them that way," she says, sounding a bit confused. "Are they still dates if there are three people on them?"
"Wait - what?"
Hibiki fiddles with one of the drawstrings of his hoodie, considering.
"I guess…" he says eventually. "As long as everyone likes each other the same way and all."
Kotone smiles.
"Well, that's not a problem then!"
Silver nearly chokes on his own spit.
"W-what?"
Hibiki laughs and stretches his arms, and Kotone reaches out across the table to grab Silver's hand in her own. By that time, Hibiki has surreptitiously wrapped his arm around Silver's shoulders, a corny grin on his face.
Silver has since turned a horrid shade of red that rivals his hair color.
"T-t-there's no way I'm going to date either of you idiots, let alone both!"
Kotone and Hibiki just laugh at the outburst (as they always do), leaving Silver to ramble on and on about their lack of common sense and their stupidity and lack of morals until the waitress returns with their food. She raises a tweezed eyebrow at them before dropping the steaming plates on the tabletop.
It isn't until then that Silver notices that Hibiki's arm is still wrapped around his shoulders and that Kotone is still holding his hand. Underneath the table, Hibiki's other foot bumps against Silver's, and Kotone does the same with her foot. Entwined as their limbs are, they make an odd and misshapen circle-two giggling idiots and a bumbling fool.
Silver grows ever redder at the thought of what they most look like.
(Still, he does not shrug them off.)
- . . . -
Silver returns to his cave and Kotone and Hibiki crawl back to wherever it is they come from, much as they always do after their excursions.
But whenever they come calling for him again, Silver joins them with considerably less protests.
- . . . -
They rent out a small house a few miles north of the Lake of Rage for the summer.
Rather, Kotone rents out a place with the money she'd been saving from all her battling and Hibiki decides to move in with her. It takes them a while to convince Silver to leave the Dragon's Den, and when they finally drag him from the cave's dark depths, he comes reluctantly, grumbling all the way.
It's more of a cabin, really. Standing humbly in a small clearing in the thick forest, complete with wooden porch and brick chimney. There is no electricity or running water. It has big windows with no curtains and unfinished hardwood floors, the surface rife with splinters.
"We'll get them finished," Kotone promises, pressing a kiss to Silver's temple.
Hibiki smiles. "Yeah, just don't take off your shoes. Those things really hurt if you do…."
"You two are ridiculous," Silver sighs in resigned exasperation.
They share a bedroom, as there is only one. It gets cold at night, so they sleep pressed together in a single bedroll, their pokémon spread out around them. The first few nights he spends in the cabin are restless, and a distant numbness sets into Silver's thoughts and sight. He goes about his days as if he were walking through a fog, and is more prone to anger than usual. Kotone and Hibiki give him the wide berth during their waking hours that they are unable to give him at night, opting to explore the surrounding forest and leave their red-haired companion to his brooding.
Silver lies awake at night and feels smothered and their suffocating warmth, his limbs numb where Hibiki's head and Kotone's abdomen have cut off the circulation. He stares at the ceiling and listens to the trilling of the bug pokémon, the sharp hoot of the ever watchful noctowl, and the deep rhythm of his companions' breathing.
When Silver was younger he dreamed of holding the world in his hands and making its people bow to him in submission. Yet now, small as it looks from this little wooden cabin in the forest, it seems more unconquerable than ever before. Then again, perhaps it is Silver who has shrunk. Weathered and eroded by the world's trials and tribulations; made smooth and modest so that his ambition no longer compels him to pursue such ultimately fruitless endeavors. He remembers his father and thinks if he ever felt this way-if the red-eyed boy and the dissolution of his organization had made him see how small he was relative to the vastness of the world like Kotone and the former Johto Champion had done for him.
For the first time in years, Silver finds himself hoping the best for the man.
Too exhausted to feel anything at the thought, he burrows his face into the crook of Hibiki's neck and lets out a small, shuddering exhale.
Before he knows it, he has fallen asleep.
- . . . -
The sunlight filters through the windowpane and wakes them the next morning.
Hibiki mumbles a bit as he hovers between wakefulness and sleep while Kotone stretches, chirping greetings at the pokémon as they also begin the lumbering rise to the surface of awareness.
Silver observes them groggily, his head perched on his arm. When Kotone notices him, she offers him a smile.
"Sleep well?" she asks hopefully.
He considers for a moment before replying.
"Yeah."
His muscles and joints are stiff and sore from the cramped sleeping arrangements, but it's true. This is the first restful sleep he's gotten in days.
Hibiki mumbles some more and lets out a small groan, burying his face into the covers and tucking his feet under Silver's calves.
"Just five more minutes, guys," he says, voice laced with sleep.
Kotone give Silver a wry look, and the redhead shrugs with pseudo-apathy at the question her gaze holds.
And so they doze the morning away.
- . . . -
Kotone slathers sunscreen onto Silver's body, paying special attention to his cheeks and nose.
"It's a sunny day; we wouldn't want you to burn," she says cheerily.
Hibiki tears past them and jumps into the lake like a cannonball, Marill close behind. The resulting splash gets them both wet, and Silver yells a few obscenities at him when he surfaces, laughing at them. Unfortunately for him, Feraligatr chooses to swipe her tail in the boy's general direction, causing a small wave to swallow Hibiki, who goes down with a small yelp.
Silver snickers and offers Feraligatr an approving nod. Satisfied, she sinks under the surface again.
"I swear," Kotone sighs, her hands rubbing lotion onto Silver's pale stomach in circular motions, "you guys are something else."
Hibiki breaks the surface with a gasping intake of breath.
"Silver! No fair!"
The redhead raises his hands in an effort to shrug off responsibility.
"I didn't do it."
Hibiki crosses his arms over his chest and promises vengeance. Silver just rolls his eyes and ignores him.
When Kotone is done applying sunscreen to Silver's pallid skin, he joins Feraligatr in the lake, lying on her stomach as she floats on her back, his feet hanging in the cool water. On the shore, Kotone sunbathes with Meganium and the rest of the pokémon, occasionally shouting happily at her red-scaled Gyarados as she swims through the waters of her ancestral home.
The day ends with a splash war that is caused by Hibiki's forsworn revenge. They walk back up the path to their little house in the woods sopping wet and laughing, holding onto each other's sun-warmed skin to avoid slipping on the stone-paved path.
- . . . -
Eventually the summer comes to and end and they leave their little cabin; Kotone resumes her duties as Champion and Hibiki goes to work for his grandparents at the Pokémon Daycare. Silver returns to his cave and broods as he always has, training and earning his money like he'd become accustomed to.
At night, however, they rejoin each other, laughing and giggling and grumbling like the misshapen circle they've learned to be.