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"You know, I can't help but feel that this princely getup you strut around in is a bit more subdued than your kit," Nessa murmured with a tap to his cravat pin, "I've always meant to grill you about your fashion."
Leon had been -bar none- the flashiest champion in any region. It's quite a feat really, considering Galar is the only region with gym uniform requirements. The Galarian Crest top was a requirement. It had to stay absolutely pristine and like-new, being replaced almost every three appearances because his stylists found a frayed edge or pit stain.
Beyond that, his accessories were his to choose, including the sponsor's cape. The champion before him wore his sponsor logos on a coverall, like racing drivers. The one before that wore her logos on a towel and sleeves, which Kabu would later emulate.
Leon sat back in his chair, pensive. He was down in Hulbury on Battle-Tower business that had been resolved, leaving him time to grab tea with Nessa, a rare event. They were the only two who'd made it in so far. Sonia was coming up from Postwick and Raihan was due to join them any moment, depending on the trainers.
Leon stroked his chin. No one had ever asked him about his particular fashion sense, assuming it was set in stone by the league when he was a kid too young to say no to a cape and a crown. That wasn't true at all. He'd had rules to follow, yes, but his flair was all his own. Well, sort of.
After all, every champion had their own special style, but Leon's was truly next level. When he'd first won the championship, he only had his black hat, unadorned and plain when viewed head-on. It wasn't until the cameras started taking wild angles that the decoration beneath the brim started making waves.
A crown for the king of Galar! How fitting!
"You look too plain Lee! Doesn't he Sonia?" The three were holed up in one of their league-provided hotel rooms on the eve of the championship finals.
Sonia nodded solemnly. Despite setting himself apart from the crowd as a magnificent trainer, Leon looked like any one of the hundreds of challengers and fans swarming into Wyndon. Couple that with his tendency to get lost in winding streets and large crowds, they'd had quite a scare when he got separated from their little group on the train ride up.
It was already clear that one of the two boys would be the next champion. They'd swept through the qualifying gyms with time to spare. Sonia and Leon had returned to Postwick while Raihan had gone to Hammerlocke, meeting up with them on the train up to Wyndon, decked out like a christmas tree.
It was a style only a ten-year-old could think of, with a hoodie sewn to look like a dragon -teeth and all- combined with a black snapback and stylish tennis shoes over his standard challenger kit. His trusty trapinch headband was moved to his neck, repurposed as a scarf to keep out sand during his wild battles.
Sonia had also customized her kit for the finals, even if she'd quietly admitted that she wasn't expecting to make it through. She'd traded the long champion shorts for a tennis-stlye skort and leggings, and changed her hair from twin tails to a side pony, like Kanto's Misty, with shiny heart clips that sparkled in the flash of cameras.
Leon however, hadn't updated his look at all! His mum had pulled out the extra kit she'd bought when he'd entered, knowing he'd hit a bit of a growth spurt at this age, so he looked just as pristine and new as the day they'd first walked across the pitch as challengers. Unfortunately that meant he didn't stand out at all!
"My rival has to be at least half as cool-looking as me," Raihan grumbled, rolling around on the bed as he tried to think. Leon felt his face tingling in a blush, but it wasn't embarrassment. It was something else that he was just too young to understand.
He hadn't put much stock into looking fancy for the championship or standing out. It's not as if Sonia hadn't dragged him along shopping for her own look. It's just that he didn't care if anyone was looking at him or not.
He hadn't cared until Raihan's blue eyes skipped over him in the crowd at Hammerlocke station, twice. It wasn't until he caught sight of Sonia that the young dragon trainer could tell him apart from the other boys in the crowd.
I almost didn't recognize you Lee. You gotta stand out more! You're my rival! I gotta be able to notice you!
Something had burned him then. It was fine if no one else could tell him apart except for his challenge number, but he really REALLY wanted Raihan to be able to pick him out of the crowd. There was a strange burn in his chest whenever Raihan would easily pick out Milo (big green towel, big brown hat) or Piers (poorly dyed and excellently spiked hair) from the crowd. He really REALLY wanted his rivals eyes on him.
Always.
"Well, it's too late to go shopping!" Sonia pouted, bringing Leon back to the present, "And I don't think Lee would look very good in my hair clips."
Raihan nodded, standing up to pace around the room,"Your hairclips suit you 'cuz you're a sweetheart. My jacket suits me cuz I'm the Dragon Kid. It's gotta have his personality!"
He had what Sonia called an "academic" look in his eye as he ran through options he could only see in his head. After a few seconds he dove for his pack, rummaging through it like a whirlwind.
"What are you looking for?" Leon asked nervously. He was willing to go along with this but he wasn't going into public with shorts on his head or something dumb like that.
"Remember that article back when we beat Stow-On-Side? It called you the Postwick Prince right?"
He did not remember any article calling him that, but then again he hadn't been too concerned with reading the league news. Had Raihan been reading all of the articles about him even though they took on gyms together? The burning feeling in his chest moved to his ears as he blushed.
"Princes need a crown!" Raihan popped up like a Spoink, holding a gold marker in triumph. He pulled his pristine snapback off of the table and started scribbling.
"I saw this in one of Nessa's fashion books," he mumbled, his hand carefully drawing out a shape, "Was going to use this lucky gold pen to sign autographs after I win, but I can spare a little ink for charity."
"Don't use up all your luck!" Leon snickered. This cocky sniping was comfortable, it was familiar, "You'll need it if you want even half a chance of beating me."
"Big words from the postwick prince," Raihan came over and slapped the hat down on Leon's head, ruffling his already messy hair, "You're not big enough to be king yet!"
"Raihan that's so clever!" Sonia exclaimed, "It really suits you Leon, you doo look like a cool prince!"
Leon bounced over to admire himself in the hotel's mirror. In six bold shaky lines, Raihan had drawn a simple enough design. Wearing the hat low, no one else could see the stripes, just an acrylic twinkle at the edge of his vision, but when he tossed his head back, it was clear as day. A crown!
He was never taking it off.
The crown had eventually come off when he'd hit his teenage growth spurt and his big head and big hair couldn't fit in the child-sized cap. The design team had been ready with a replacement. There was an entire line on the Devon Corp's Clothing company floor dedicated to crown-cap replicas for Leon's ever-growing fan club.
The original crown was kept safe in a keepsake display box in his old bedroom, complete with his original challenger's kit. Raihan still pointed and laughed at his own terrible scribbly linework whenever he came down to visit.
"Can't believe you wore it for so long mate," Raihan had chuckled as they plopped down on his bed after being stuffed full of his mum's shepherd's pie.
"Thought you'd get a sit down with the league designers and pick something more suitable for your image," Raihan parroted the head designer's posh accent particularly well,"Yknow they hate this hoodie? 'Hides my kit' too much. Hammerlocke is cold! Dragons are weak to ice. I told Clarice that when I take over I'm making hoodies mandatory, gotta protect my trainees."
Leon laughed loudly. He was always getting those talks too. At five years in office, he was the longest-standing champion in Galar history. It turns out, most champions didn't last long enough to warrant a wardrobe adaptation.
Most champions didn't hit a growth spurt mid-season, turning their floor-length cape into a knee-length one. After hitting puberty, Rose and the design team would always surround him with racks on racks of the latest accessories, trying to steer him into something a little less involved to resize. Oleana was partial to the hiker's puffer vest. something about not having to worry about sleeves when he inevitably bulked up.
He was going through another teenage growth spurt and once again his apartment was full of "accessory options" trying to replace his cape and cap. The growth plates in his knees and ankles were aching in their desperate attempt to keep up with Raihan, who came back from the dragon training school in Hoenn looking like he'd been pulled on both ends by an angry Bewear.
"Haha! They can try all they like, the cap is iconic!"
"Of course it is! I've got the golden touch you know," Raihan turned on his side to regard Leon," Though I never figured out your cape. I know the wool is for Postwick but why not a shepherd's jacket like you wear when you're here?"
"Thought it went well with the prince motif," Leon lied smoothly. He'd grown much better at hiding his blush and coming up with bullshit on the spot, which was good because he'd been having a crisis about Raihan being on his bed for the past twenty minutes.
The truth was far, far more embarrassing and very, very simple. Leon was jealous. After losing the championship, Raihan had turned his attention elsewhere, specifically the central islands. Kalos, Hoenn, Johto.
They didn't get to meet often now that Leon was champion and swamped with duties year-round, and when they did all Raihan would talk about was Lance and the dragon-training school.
Lance this, Lance that. It was all Lance all the time. His rotomphone background was still a picture of Rai, Lee, and Sonia in the tunnel after the championship, but his lock screen was now a picture of Lance and his Dragonite. Leon hated seeing the Indigo Plateau master smiling cockily past Raihan's shoulder whenever he opened his phone.
Raihan's room in Hammerlocke was covered in Lance posters, and he even had a replica cape in his closet! It was clear that the dragon fanboy would run off to follow his idol the moment he got a chance, and he had plenty, being confirmed as one of the strongest trainers in the region.
But where would that leave Leon?
The burning feeling in his chest had come back with a vengeance when he saw the way Raihan's eyes lit up in awe and admiration at Lance on his television. He'd diverted his train schedule to visit Raihan in Hammerlocke for a sleepover before going to spend the rest of his vacation with his mum in Postwick. The boy lived alone and they could make as much noise and mess as they wanted. It was a ritual he'd come to look forward to in his few years as champion.
"Lee did you see that?! He makes it look so cool! He doesn't need the cape but he really looks like a king!"
Leon couldn't stand it. He wanted to grab the remote and kill the feed. He wanted to run in front of the screen and block his view. He wanted to be the only one in Raihan's line of sight. Instead he put on his best smile and laugh.
"Yea, he looks pretty posh like that. You think I could pull off a cape? It would have more space for logos than just my kit."
Raihan's head swiveled with a huge smile and excitement in his eyes,"You look cool in anything Lee!"
So for his third year defending his title, he'd happily strutted out onto Wyndon field hoping to impress his rival with his bold, flowing cape, only to find out that he'd left for Hoenn. A scholarship to Lance's training school.
A notification from Raihan's private Pikagram calling his new look "Galar Royalty" was the only thing that kept the cape from the shred bin that year.
Raihan probably didn't even remember mentioning the cape thing. He was infuriating that way. The fifteen-year-old dragon enthusiast was a certified Ace trainer in three regions, a wunderkind on the level of Roxanne. He could remember the evolution trees, egg groups, and potential move sets of over four hundred pokemon and counting, but couldn't remember that he was the one who first said Leon would look good in a cape.
Then again, it probably wasn't fair to expect that. He didn't know, didn't have a clue how much Leon's world revolved around him.
Raihan only chuckled at his explanation,"You're right bruv. Especially with that little goatee you've been trying out. Some real King shit. Wish i could grow one. Comes out too twiggy."
The young champion pulled his hat -new, custom manufactured- low over his eyes, feigning tiredness to hide the blush he could feel creeping over his face, "Yea, Rose hates it, can only get away with it on vacation."
"Well I'm sure, he's gotta spend an hour a week getting his chin strap aligned, the wanker. Yours looks right proper though, makes you look older and all sharplike," Raihan stroked his still-smooth upper lip, "I'm lucky I'm tall or they'd think a baby was runnin' Hammerlocke. Can't even get peach fuzz! How come yours came in so easy?"
Leon nearly jumped out of his skin when he felt warm fingers stroke along the border of his scraggly five-o'clock shadow and his fancy goatee. He ended up on the floor, his hat thrown onto the ceiling fan in surprise.
"Oi didn't know you were that ticklish mate!" Raihan was rolling in laughter, "You jumped three feet!"
The lanky trainer reached out his hand to help Leon back up onto his bed, still giggling,"Y'don't have to look so cross mate. Weren't on purpose. Won't do it again!"
Leon stuck out his tongue and plopped back into his spot, his tongue too tied to tell him the truth.
I'd like it if you did that again. I'd like it very much.
The last part of Leon's champion style came rather late in his tenure. He'd had the same haircut since he was a kid. His barber in Postwick - an Alolan expat- called it the Incineroar.
It was easy enough for a ten-year-old on his first journey to maintain, and simpler still for his new league hairstylist to comb and gel into perfect parts for photoshoots. There was no need to look into a style that suited him so perfectly, especially not when most of the time it was contained in a hat.
He hadn't planned on ever changing it until a couple of years ago. A charity had publicly asked the Galar champion to grow his hair out as a fundraising event for the Galarian Orphanage Coalition. One month without a cut for every million Pokedollars raised, to be matched by the League. Leon jumped at the chance before he'd even really heard the entire proposal. The GOC was Raihan's favorite charity, after all.
Leon had not been prepared for the announcement to awaken some sort of sleeper cell desperate for him to have long, flowing locks. They hit the max within a few weeks, locking in Leon to a whole year without a visit to the barber.
Thing was, Leon's hair had a mind of its own. It grew long and limp at the back, while his fringe and sideburns attempted a rebellion at even the presence of a flat iron. It was thick and blew all over his face while posing for pictures or giving speeches outdoors, not to mention on the battle pitch. Raihan's sandstorm left him looking like a dazzled Tangela, despite his win.
Leon was pretty tired of it after a year. It was too hard to wash all the sand out now that it fell down his back, and he was sure he'd already gone through a fortune in the fancy conditioner that magically refilled whenever the maid service came through.
He said as much to Raihan when they lounged on his fancy couch in his fancy Wyndon suite, relaxing in a rare quiet morning.
"It'll be a shame to see it all go," Raihan reached over the back of the couch with the same easy familiarity he'd always had, carding his fingers through the ends and holding up a lock to inspect.
Leon stared transfixed at the dragon gym leader as Raihan looked just over his shoulder. His face was relaxed in a lazy and content smile that reminded him of Charmanders in a lava bath. It was something no one else got to see but him, Raihan's public persona was almost aggressively alert and chipper. Still, despite having seen this face hundreds of times, when the morning light reflected dazzlingly off his blue eyes, Leon's heart jumped into his throat with the same speed it always did.
"Y'know your hair sparkles in the light when it gets hit just right. Never seen anyone's do that," Raihan murmured pensively, going back to carelessly running his hand through Leon's loose hair, smiling at the plopping sound it made against the back of the couch.
Leon had never had hair this long, not even as a kid, so no one had done this for him before, and he was going to turn into mush.
"Yea, but I saw my stylist sharpening her shears the other night, looking at me like a hungry Morpeko," the champion admitted, "I'm afraid she'll turn on me if I don't let her take it off tomorrow."
Raihan laughed and the hairs on Leon's skin stood straight up as he felt the movement translated through his scalp. The feeling shot through his hair follicles, into his skull, and directly to the last two brain cells that weren't hopeless for the young gym leader, obliterating them instantly.
His mind didn't even register the words he said until they'd spilled out.
"I'll keep it if you kiss me."
Raihan's too-sharp teeth glinted in the morning sunlight as he smiled, not surprised or shocked in the slightest. He gathered a shining, purple lock in his hand and tugged it gently, giving it a soft kiss. Leon was old enough now to know exactly what the heat surging in his belly meant.
"At least let her at your ends. They could use a trimming."
"Oh my Arceus," Nessa's irritated face brought Leon back to the present. Had he said it all out loud?
"It's written all over your face Love," Sonia clapped him on the back as she passed to slide into the loveseat beside her girlfriend, "I told her you were so bloody daft for Raihan that you dressed up like some confused peacock, she wouldn't believe me. Said you had more sense than that, didn't ya Lovely? "
"I was wrong," Nessa sighed, her confidence in the new chairman shattered, now that she knew he was no more than a lovesick yamper wrapped around Raihan's little finger. Pitiful, but she didn't have much room to talk. Melony called it something along the lines of pots and kettles.
"Did he pick out the new outfit too? That I wasn't sure on," Sonia reached over to bat at his carefully fluffed cravat.
"He picked it all on his own, down to his skivvies. I was very careful to offer only support and no opinions," Raihan said as he leaned down to steal a kiss before folding himself into the chair beside Leon, "Even if it took three weeks of running around to boutiques to finish it."
"I asked you to help me out a hundred times!" Leon sputtered.
Raihan only leaned back with the confidence of a lordly dragon,"I'm saving my thoughts for the wedding."