When evening eventually starts to set in, Ran gathers his team and starts heading back to Goldenrod City. Caesar, he keeps out of his ball for company and as a mild deterrent for any trainers that may want to challenge him on the road back to the city. The others are recalled easily, none of them seeming to mind after getting to spend nearly the entire day out of their balls.
It’s something he’ll need to make more time for in the future, as his pokémon have been spending a lot more time in their balls ever since he set out on his journey. Though none of them have really seemed upset about this change to their lives, the way they all openly enjoyed themselves today still makes for a stark contrast with the long stretches he’s spent on the road over the past weeks. Of course traveling is a reality of life as a trainer, but there’s a lot of time left until the Conference and he’s already got three of the eight badges he needs. Taking a slightly more easy-going approach should definitely be possible and there’s little doubt that it’ll benefit his team.
Because the day’s two training sessions were without a doubt the most productive training sessions they’ve had in a long while. Between Caesar finally mastering both Acid Spray and Sludge Bomb, Golbat doing the same for Haze and Venoshock, Aria swiftly learning Toxic Spikes before starting to make some progress on Sucker Punch towards the end of the day’s training and Skorupi proudly showing off Bug Bite as the result of his work with Aria, his team has measurably and markedly improved compared to when they set out in the morning. Said improvement far exceeds the wildest hopes he’d held for the day when initially setting out.
That, then, likely explains why he’s in a spectacularly pleasant mood right now. The evening air is pleasant, not too cloyingly warm but not chilly either. There’s a light ache in his muscles from the day’s exertions, but nothing bad enough to be bothersome or truly painful. Slithering along by his side,Caesar is still visibly basking in the novelty of his evolution, a single imperious look from him enough to scare off an overly curious Drowzee despite his inherent type-disadvantage.
In short, though there are countless hurdles yet to clear, he feels on top of the world at this moment. The prospect of a good dinner, a hot shower and a comfortable bed only further reinforce his good mood, to the point where he’s just about ready to start skipping back towards the city. Some faint remnant of self-restraint keeps him from going quite that far though.
It’s just after entering Goldenrod City, with Caesar freshly recalled and just as he’s accepting the convenient cup of pasta he’s picked up from a food stall to eat on the go, that his pokégear buzzes with an incoming message. It takes a bit of finagling, considering the cup of pasta and the fork he’s holding, but he manages to check the message without spilling anything.
She asks where he’s at, a second message clarifying that she’s currently at the pokécenter looking for him. Ran responds with a quick explanation, promising that he’s on his way there now, which Josie apparently considers a good response, as she responds with a simple thumbs up.
The promise of finally getting some further clarification as to just where Josie’s head ended up is enough incentive for him to swiftly scarf down the rest of his pasta, even as he picks up the pace towards the pokécenter slightly. Just a handful minutes later, still wiping around the corners of his mouth to make sure there’s no pasta sauce lingering on his face, Ran enters the main lobby, before easily bypassing the nurse’s desk and instead turning directly towards the hallway that holds his room.
There, Josie stands leaning against the wall next to his door, arms crossed under her chest as she idly taps away at her pokégear.
“Josie,” Ran greets her, continuing to approach until he’s standing next to her, so he can unlock his room’s door, “Come on in.”
“Thanks.” She acknowledges, following him inside before coming to a sudden stop.
Ran for his part is faintly aware of the sounds of Josie’s footsteps coming to an abrupt halt, but he doesn’t pay them much mind, instead focused on finally taking off his backpack and taking off his shoes. Only when that’s done and when he’s moving to sit on his own bed, does he look towards Josie, before realizing why she’s stopped in place, as she looks at the pokémon bed that takes up the other half of the room with an inscrutable expression.
“I guess they don’t have those in whatever hotels you’re staying in?” Ran asks, sliding over towards the head of his bed before gesturing towards the foot invitingly as he draws his own legs up to sit comfortably against the headboard.
“No, they do.” Josie denies, looking around the room once more, before finally seeming to accept that her options for seating are limited to an uncomfortable desk chair, a pokémon bed and Ran’s bed. Thankfully for Ran’s self-esteem, at least his bed wins out in that particular race, as Josie finally steps further into the room before sitting down on the other side of the bed.
As she settles down, legs still off the bed as she sits sideways, only looking at Ran from the corner of her eye, she expands upon her answer easily, “The places I’m staying at just don’t make you choose between bedspace and room for your pokémon. I didn’t really think about the lack of space for your team when I saw the room you were staying in back in Violet. Is this standard for a pokécenter room? Because my room in the pokécenter back in Azalea was definitely bigger than this one.”
“I haven’t been to enough different centers to really know if it’s ‘standard’,” Ran clarifies, fingers rising to form the appropriate air quotes even as he realizes that Josie probably didn’t book a ‘standard’ room at all, back in Azalea, “But as far as I’ve seen, this is what a normal one-person room looks like, yeah. There’s usually also a large communal dormitory, but honestly this isn’t that much more expensive and at least this way my team can spend the night outside of their balls.”
“No, I get that.” Josie accepts, waving off his explanation as she looks about the room, before finally her eyes land upon him properly, her upper body turning slightly to face him more directly, at which point she draws in a deep breath.
“Honestly, it’s whatever, I’m just beating around the bush. Let’s just do this.” She declares assertively, before falling silent once more.
“Well, it’d help if I knew just what we’re doing…” Ran replies drolly, trailing off as he waits somewhat impatiently for Josie to actually get to whatever point she wants to raise.
She lets out a heavy sigh, shoulders drooping for a moment, before she visibly psyches herself up once more.
Finally, she speaks, the words coming out in a swift rush as she clearly forces them out before she can second guess herself, “I want to start riding to Ecruteak City tomorrow.”
Ran has to blink a few times, somewhat taken aback by the unexpected announcement. Josie merely sits quietly, staring at him intently, clearly waiting for him to speak. He takes a moment to process her words and just what they mean, before finally doing just that.
“Okay so you don’t want to stick around Goldenrod to re-challenge Whitney in the short term, that’s fair,” He accepts easily, before frowning slightly, “I’m not completely opposed to Ecruteak next, but personally I was hoping to go to Cianwood next, so if you’ve got any-”
He’s cut off by Josie, who interrupts his attempt at convincing her with another rush of words, “I want to start riding to Ecruteak City tomorrow, alone.”
“Oh,” Ran lets out in surprise, before, as Josie’s words really sink in, repeating the same word more slowly, “Oooooooohh.”
“Yeah, oh.” Josie huffs in dismay, finally looking away from him as she instead develops a sudden interest in the texture of the pokécenter’s standard bed sheets.
She remains quiet after that, giving Ran enough time to parse through Josie’s words and process just how he feels about them. His first true reaction, the emotion that soon pushes away his initial confusion, is resentful. Just because he won the badge and she didn’t, she’s dumping him as a companion? How dare she!
Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.
An angry outburst is on the tip of his tongue, but, perhaps thanks to some lingering sense of fulfillment from the day’s successes, he holds off on actually unleashing his verbal vitriol. Josie’s expression, tentative, unwilling to meet his eyes, doesn’t suit that of someone out to hurt him. As open a book as she is, he’s confident that she’s not acting, at which point frustrated resentment makes way for dismay. That’s the emotion he ends up verbalizing.
“Why?” He ends up asking after a long minute has passed, “I thought we were both enjoying traveling together?”
“I was!” Josie immediately clarifies, finally meeting his eyes once more, her sincerity clearly visible there as whatever dam has been holding back her words finally bursts, “This isn’t because I don’t like traveling with you or because you’ve done anything wrong or whatever. But I’m not making progress as a trainer right now and you definitely are so, until I’ve figured some stuff out, I can’t be around you when you keep making these huge leaps forward whilst I’m stuck in place!”
Josie’s eyes widen in fear as she ends up shouting at him, only to frantically continue before Ran can get a word in edgewise, “If we do keep traveling together, I’m just going to become jealous of you! But I know that I shouldn’t be because it’s not your fault that I’m not making progress so then I’ll end up loathing my own behavior and I don’t want that. Not to mention the part where you don’t deserve me bitching at you, just because you’re doing well as a trainer!”
Josie draws in a few heaving breaths once she finishes speaking, clearly having pushed her lungs to the limit by rushing out so many words without taking in any proper breaths. It left Ran unable to get a word in, but now the tables are turned as she has to recover her breath, finally giving him an opportunity to reply.
But he doesn’t. Not immediately, at least. Instead, he considers Josie’s words carefully.
She feels that she’s not progressing as fast as him and that’s going to lead to a spiral of blame, jealousy and self-loathing… Is that a reasonable explanation? What if their positions were reversed? If he’d lost their first battle, lost against Grady and now lost against Whitney, whilst watching Josie win instead and evolve her starter?
That’s something he has to think about for a few long seconds, before coming to a conclusion about himself that admittedly isn’t all that flattering. At least it makes understanding Josie a lot easier, which is what drives his next words.
“Alright,” He replies succinctly, offering a nod to go along with his words, “If that’s what you feel like you need to do, then that’s how it is.”
His reply is measured and calm, which is why Josie doing a visible double-take feels pretty unfair.
“It’s alright? Really?” She repeats uncertainly, staring at him as if he’s grown a second head, “I’ve been beating myself up over this for hours and all you’ve got to say is that it’s alright?”
Ran shrugs, unsure just what kind of reaction she was expecting then, “I enjoy traveling with you, but we never made any hard deals or promises to each other and I don’t want either of us to end up resenting the other. So yeah, it’s alright. If you feel like you need to ride to Ecruteak, then you should ride to Ecruteak. It’s your journey.”
Josie merely gapes at him like a fish in response, drawing a sigh from Ran, before he explains his own thoughts further, “Look, I wasn’t expecting that you wouldn’t want to travel together anymore, but I did expect you to want to go to Ecruteak. Vulpix makes sense for your team and just sticking around Goldenrod for a few weeks doesn’t seem like your style, so it’s not that big of a surprise. If you really had your mind set on it, I was willing to come along. Of course I was hoping to convince you to go to Cianwood first, because I like that route better and it suits my own long-term plans better, but this way, we both get to travel the route we prefer without any hard feelings either way.”
“And you’re not upset that I’m dumping you?” She asks, her typically straightforward choice of words finally drawing a slight wince from Ran.
“Well I’m not particularly enthusiastic about the word ‘dumping’,” He admits, finally drawing a guilty grin from Josie, “But no, I can understand it. Even when we were traveling here, you were already missing the opportunity to ride Ginger as much as you wanted. And if you know that traveling together is just going to lead to us fighting, then it’s better to call it quits here. Besides, I honestly think I’ll enjoy traveling with just my team for company. We’ve gotten a lot stronger compared to when we just started out, it’s not as if either of us should really need a companion for safety purposes, at this point.”
Earlier, he got a guilty grin, this time, he actually manages to draw an audible laugh from Josie, as she finally seems to ease up once more. At first, she still seems a bit tentative, but when Ran remains placid, she finally openly grins, falling over on her back and letting her upper body lay across the bed lazily, rather than holding her awkward sidewards sitting position any longer.
“Safety purposes, please. I’ve got a team of living fire hazards, ain’t nobody laying a finger on me.” She declares, looking up at the ceiling for a moment, before rolling over onto her side to meet his gaze once more. For his own part, he’s not nearly as restless as Josie, continuing to rest comfortably against his pillow which in turn rests against the headboard.
“There’s always a bigger Gyarados out there,” Ran warns seriously, before easing up once more, “But yeah, with my team where it’s at now compared to when we first went through Union Cave, it’s not as if traveling on my own will actually be dangerous either. Maybe it’ll do us both good to spend some time with just our own teams for company.”
“That’s what I was thinking!” Josie confirms enthusiastically, bouncing upright with renewed energy before suddenly pointing a threatening finger in his direction, “Man, this is going a lot better than I thought it would.”
Ran offers a teasing grin, confident enough that Josie’s back to being herself to launch a small verbal jab, “Well alright, thanks for thinking the worst of me, friend.”
“Oh I didn’t mean it like that,” Josie waves him off once more, as if swatting away a particularly persistent fly, “You know I didn’t mean it like that. You’re a good dude, Ran.”
He’s about to smugly accept the compliment, but before he can, Ran is cut off, as Josie raises a finger threateningly even as she bounces off of the mattress, “Though don’t think for a moment that this means I’ll go easy on you when we run into each other later, you hear? I’ll be kicking your ass at the Conference, no matter what!”
“Sure you will,” He scoffs tauntingly, “In your dreams!”
“Ha!” Josie barks out a laugh, before returning fire with a taunt of her own, “You, feature in my dreams? Wishful thinking, buddy boy!”
What follows is ten minutes of increasingly childish mutual taunting, before they eventually run out of gas. The silence that settles over them both is a companionable one, though there’s also a sense of finality to it.
When Josie opens her mouth once more, Ran isn’t surprised by the words that come out.
“I’m going to head out. I’d say ‘keep in touch’, but that kind of goes against the whole resentment thing, so I’ll just text you once I’m feeling better about my own performances, alright?” She offers, rising from the bed, which she’d fallen back onto somewhere in the middle of their verbal joust, as she does so.
The thought of not keeping in touch at all in the short term isn’t a pleasant one, but it’s one he somewhat begrudgingly accepts nevertheless.
“Sure thing,” Ran accepts, rising from the bed himself, to leave them both standing only a few feet from each other, as he wavers between offering a hand for Josie to shake and simply waiting for her to leave, “Kick ass out there.”
Josie meets his gaze once more, before finally, with a sort of muted huff, stepping closer, grabbing his coat by the collar and planting him with a kiss.
Ran can only stand there awkwardly, completely frozen in place as he is suddenly acutely reminded of the minor detail that Josie is in fact a very pretty girl. Before he can even properly start to process that fact or even what’s happening to him in the first place, the kiss is already over. Josie meets his eyes once more before, with an infuriatingly smug smile, turning on her heel and leaving his room, the door falling shut behind her.
It leaves him standing around uselessly for a few seconds, before his hand tentatively comes up to touch his lips in disbelief. What just happened?
He wants to go out and chase after Josie, to demand some kind of explanation, but not only would that go directly against her wishes, he also really doesn’t want her to end up regretting what she just did. Because that was really quite enjoyable. So he just stands there for a few more seconds, before finally plonking back down on his bed.
Eventually, still trying to fully work through what just happened and what his feelings about it mean, he starts to release his team. They materialize easily and, upon realizing they’re back in the same room as the previous night, return to their previous sleeping locations. By the time they’re done, Ran has settled more comfortably on his own bed once more, glancing around for a moment, before starting to catch his team up on his conversation with Josie, though he does omit her chosen means of saying goodbye.
They take the news well, none of them having gotten especially close with any of Josie’s own team members, though Skorupi at least expresses some disappointment at the idea of losing his playmates in Chief the Growlithe and Soot the Houndour. Still, it’s only the work of a few minutes to catch his team up on the evening’s events, at which point they all settle in for the night.
As for Ran, he takes that long-awaited shower, changes into his sleeping wear and brushes his teeth. By the time he heads to bed, it’s with thoughts of wandering the roads alone, with only his team to keep him company. They’re happy thoughts, rather than scary ones, easily carrying him off to sleep. Though when he dreams, it isn’t just of the journey ahead, but also of a pair of warm, slightly chapped lips.
The next morning, one of the first things he does is book a ticket on the next ship to Cianwood City.