Fic: Present Past Tense, Pokemon Ranger
Title: Present Past Tense
Author: wingsofcharity
Fandom: Pokemon Ranger
Pairing: Hastings/Gordor
Rating: G. How sad.
Word Count: 1,118
Warnings: Spoilers for the end of the first Ranger game. Not that there's much to spoil for, but you never know.
Disclaimer: Pokemon is having buttsex with Nintendo. I get it.
done for the prompt "19. books" at 20_firstkisses
Fiore was still young, and Icarus Gordor even younger, when he met Oliver Hastings.
There wasn't a lot anyone needed to know about Gordor's childhood. It was pretty much the same as anyone else's childhood; or, at least, he assumed so, as he had never lived anyone else's childhood but his own. He came from the same stock everyone else in Fiore came from: immigrant stock, from the big, bustling metropolises of Kanto and the backwoods small towns of Hoenn, and Gordor was part of the generation that burned out early from all the dreaming their parents did for them.
His father owned a bookstore, set aways off the main roads and behind one of the flower stands and a booth that sold bathsalts and always filled the store with amazing, if conflicting, smells right after it rained. It was difficult to find unless you were looking for it.
Gordor liked watching the store; he liked the cleanliness of making lists and cataloguing books and the way it made his fingertips smell like graphite for days, and the excitement of opening each new shipment like it was his birthday. It was back when he even liked the customers, too, or maybe it was just back when he liked people.
Oliver Hastings wasn't a patron, and later he learned that Hastings really wasn't a patron of anything; he liked giving everything its fair chance and Gordor remembers his face the first time he walked into his shop, a natural bright curiosity that had been driven out of Gordor and his siblings.
"Do you have anything new?" he asked with all the tact of an adolescent, and Gordor was too busy trying to figure out if he had seen the kid before somewhere to be insulted.
"Yeah," he said. "We got just a box come in from Canaclave, in Sinnoh." He got to his feet, brushing non-existent dust off his slacks. "I don't know what you're into, but I just got done reading this book on the legendary Pokemon, written by this Sinnohian guy who's been chasing myths since he was real little. It's really cool, because you can tell how much he loves his work. And it's got cool pictures, too, of all of the legendary Pokemon."
Hastings looked kind of like a Sudowoodo, he was so long and a little spotty, and his hair was artistically mussed up and a rather noxious shade of orange. He didn't look the part to be too interested in books, but he appeared to be in an amiable mood and beamed at the prospect. "I like the sound of that! I wanted to be a Pokemon Trainer when I was younger."
"What happened?" Gordor asked, disappearing into the shelves to find the book.
"I came here," he shrugged, the way people always shrug off the thoughts they had as a child, back when their thoughts made more sense. "Still doesn't mean I can't learn everything I can about them."
All things considered, it wasn't a very deep thing to say, but it left its impression on Gordor.
Fiore was still idyllic, and Gordor still idealistic, when he kissed Hastings for the first time.
It wasn't a very good kiss, he recalled, as it didn't set his nerves on fire or his hair stand on end or anything like that, but he wasn't waiting for it to. There wasn't any reason for it, either, he just leaned up in the middle of the hallway and pressed a quick kiss to his mouth. It might have something to do with the fact neither of them have seen sunlight in days, and sleep in even longer.
"This coming from the mouth of someone who insists, rather idiotically, that the 'L' on a Ranger Leader's badge stands for 'Loser'," commented Hastings wryly, and Gordor might have kissed him again for this, if not for the fear of being taken the wrong way.
Gordor remembered those days clearly, cleanly, and incandescently as being the beginning of the end. Fiore was their fresh plate, their palette to draw upon; their parents had built it up and now it was theirs to shape and mold, and Gordor had so many dreams he felt like he could never breathe.
Not only were a lot of these dreams told to Hastings wistfully, over monotonous tasks like brewing coffee or cleaning out the Abra cages, a lot of them involved Hastings, and that rankled the most.
Half the time he blamed Hastings for stealing his ideas and using them to go his own way, for not cooperating with him, and even worse, for not being a good friend, and the other half of the time, he wanted to make the journey to Fall City and find him and ask him what he thinks of this or that or the other thing, and both of them make his chest close up.
Gordor forgot what breathing felt somewhere between kissing Hastings in the laboratory hallway and getting married and having quadruplets and formulating his last plan.
Fiore still belonged to the Rangers, and Gordor understood clearly how poisoned it had become, when he saw Hastings for the last time.
The betrayal in his eyes was ironic, and comical, and Gordor felt the ridiculous urge to laugh, and did. His laughter always did define him, his father said. He didn't know where his children were, or if they were even alive, and he thought it should pain him, the thought that he might have killed them, but mostly he just feels like he'd been electrocuted. And maybe he had; the back of his eyelids burn with the image of Plusle and Minun, the ridiculous, small, insignificant Pokemon, jumping up and down on his Styler (his! His, not Hastings's!) and sparks flying everywhere. His whole body hummed with sticky, unpleasant energy.
There was probably a lot of things he didn't understand, didn't know, the kinds of things that keep other people ticking, because he'd only lived his one life and he won't ever understand that he was different; different like he had always wanted to be. Different had become synonymous with Hastings, and he wasn't Hastings.
Gordor was here because his parents had dreamed him to be.
Gordor was here because he needed to make a better Fiore for his children to grow up in, forgetting that they were already grown up and the Fiore he had failed to change was going to be the Fiore that would save them.
Gordor was here because of the Ranger Union, whose sentimentality spared him his life, and because of Oliver Hastings, whose sentimentality was offering him a second chance.
But Hastings wanted the Gordor who read books about legendary Pokemon and who'd kissed him for no other reason than he wanted to. He wanted that childhood friend, and that wasn't so much a second chance as the first chance, only played better, and Icarus Gordor was spiteful enough to deny him.
The Sekra Range swallowed him up, and in the silence his ears rang with organ music and his nose was filled with the smell of bath salts.
Author: wingsofcharity
Fandom: Pokemon Ranger
Pairing: Hastings/Gordor
Rating: G. How sad.
Word Count: 1,118
Warnings: Spoilers for the end of the first Ranger game. Not that there's much to spoil for, but you never know.
Disclaimer: Pokemon is having buttsex with Nintendo. I get it.
done for the prompt "19. books" at 20_firstkisses
Fiore was still young, and Icarus Gordor even younger, when he met Oliver Hastings.
There wasn't a lot anyone needed to know about Gordor's childhood. It was pretty much the same as anyone else's childhood; or, at least, he assumed so, as he had never lived anyone else's childhood but his own. He came from the same stock everyone else in Fiore came from: immigrant stock, from the big, bustling metropolises of Kanto and the backwoods small towns of Hoenn, and Gordor was part of the generation that burned out early from all the dreaming their parents did for them.
His father owned a bookstore, set aways off the main roads and behind one of the flower stands and a booth that sold bathsalts and always filled the store with amazing, if conflicting, smells right after it rained. It was difficult to find unless you were looking for it.
Gordor liked watching the store; he liked the cleanliness of making lists and cataloguing books and the way it made his fingertips smell like graphite for days, and the excitement of opening each new shipment like it was his birthday. It was back when he even liked the customers, too, or maybe it was just back when he liked people.
Oliver Hastings wasn't a patron, and later he learned that Hastings really wasn't a patron of anything; he liked giving everything its fair chance and Gordor remembers his face the first time he walked into his shop, a natural bright curiosity that had been driven out of Gordor and his siblings.
"Do you have anything new?" he asked with all the tact of an adolescent, and Gordor was too busy trying to figure out if he had seen the kid before somewhere to be insulted.
"Yeah," he said. "We got just a box come in from Canaclave, in Sinnoh." He got to his feet, brushing non-existent dust off his slacks. "I don't know what you're into, but I just got done reading this book on the legendary Pokemon, written by this Sinnohian guy who's been chasing myths since he was real little. It's really cool, because you can tell how much he loves his work. And it's got cool pictures, too, of all of the legendary Pokemon."
Hastings looked kind of like a Sudowoodo, he was so long and a little spotty, and his hair was artistically mussed up and a rather noxious shade of orange. He didn't look the part to be too interested in books, but he appeared to be in an amiable mood and beamed at the prospect. "I like the sound of that! I wanted to be a Pokemon Trainer when I was younger."
"What happened?" Gordor asked, disappearing into the shelves to find the book.
"I came here," he shrugged, the way people always shrug off the thoughts they had as a child, back when their thoughts made more sense. "Still doesn't mean I can't learn everything I can about them."
All things considered, it wasn't a very deep thing to say, but it left its impression on Gordor.
Fiore was still idyllic, and Gordor still idealistic, when he kissed Hastings for the first time.
It wasn't a very good kiss, he recalled, as it didn't set his nerves on fire or his hair stand on end or anything like that, but he wasn't waiting for it to. There wasn't any reason for it, either, he just leaned up in the middle of the hallway and pressed a quick kiss to his mouth. It might have something to do with the fact neither of them have seen sunlight in days, and sleep in even longer.
"This coming from the mouth of someone who insists, rather idiotically, that the 'L' on a Ranger Leader's badge stands for 'Loser'," commented Hastings wryly, and Gordor might have kissed him again for this, if not for the fear of being taken the wrong way.
Gordor remembered those days clearly, cleanly, and incandescently as being the beginning of the end. Fiore was their fresh plate, their palette to draw upon; their parents had built it up and now it was theirs to shape and mold, and Gordor had so many dreams he felt like he could never breathe.
Not only were a lot of these dreams told to Hastings wistfully, over monotonous tasks like brewing coffee or cleaning out the Abra cages, a lot of them involved Hastings, and that rankled the most.
Half the time he blamed Hastings for stealing his ideas and using them to go his own way, for not cooperating with him, and even worse, for not being a good friend, and the other half of the time, he wanted to make the journey to Fall City and find him and ask him what he thinks of this or that or the other thing, and both of them make his chest close up.
Gordor forgot what breathing felt somewhere between kissing Hastings in the laboratory hallway and getting married and having quadruplets and formulating his last plan.
Fiore still belonged to the Rangers, and Gordor understood clearly how poisoned it had become, when he saw Hastings for the last time.
The betrayal in his eyes was ironic, and comical, and Gordor felt the ridiculous urge to laugh, and did. His laughter always did define him, his father said. He didn't know where his children were, or if they were even alive, and he thought it should pain him, the thought that he might have killed them, but mostly he just feels like he'd been electrocuted. And maybe he had; the back of his eyelids burn with the image of Plusle and Minun, the ridiculous, small, insignificant Pokemon, jumping up and down on his Styler (his! His, not Hastings's!) and sparks flying everywhere. His whole body hummed with sticky, unpleasant energy.
There was probably a lot of things he didn't understand, didn't know, the kinds of things that keep other people ticking, because he'd only lived his one life and he won't ever understand that he was different; different like he had always wanted to be. Different had become synonymous with Hastings, and he wasn't Hastings.
Gordor was here because his parents had dreamed him to be.
Gordor was here because he needed to make a better Fiore for his children to grow up in, forgetting that they were already grown up and the Fiore he had failed to change was going to be the Fiore that would save them.
Gordor was here because of the Ranger Union, whose sentimentality spared him his life, and because of Oliver Hastings, whose sentimentality was offering him a second chance.
But Hastings wanted the Gordor who read books about legendary Pokemon and who'd kissed him for no other reason than he wanted to. He wanted that childhood friend, and that wasn't so much a second chance as the first chance, only played better, and Icarus Gordor was spiteful enough to deny him.
The Sekra Range swallowed him up, and in the silence his ears rang with organ music and his nose was filled with the smell of bath salts.