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While Gladion knows he's traveled everywhere in Alola and he knows the region like the back of his palm, he also knows there are many places he's never visited.
Sure, Gladion has explored the Haina Desert in search of Tapu Koko to fulfill Guzma's psychotic desires for power. Sure, he has gone up and down Brooklet Hill and he's gone climbing in the Ten Carat Hill. Gladion has walked by the pink flowers all over the Royal Avenue, he has taken a nap with Silvally between lilac flowers and small Oricorios. Alola is all dew and sunlight, and wherever the sun reaches, Gladion is certain he's been there before.
That is, until he stumbles with an area he had never explored: the Melemele Meadows.
If he were to be honest, his knowledge of Melemele, in general, are short. He's only been there for a handful of festivals (be it while hiding, be it with his friends), to visit Hau and to visit Moon. He has a few memories of attending the Trainers' School when he was a kid and a few of bathing at the beach with Lillie and Lusamine.
He's never been here, though. There's so much orange, yellow and sunlight it's impossible to think he's never been here before. The area seems to shine on its own, as though the sun is completely unnecessary, and, upon stumbling in, Gladion momentarily ponders if this area would shine as bright even when the stars go blue.
Silvally runs into the maze of flowers and rolls around the fields with trills of excitement. Gladion observes his Pokémon from the small plateau at the entrance, surveying the area until he finds a blur of shadows and the tingling of familiar laughter invading the middle of the meadow.
Silvally barks at whoever is lying there as Gladion approaches, and much to his surprise, Moon springs from the ground, laughing as Silvally licks her face and the Champion scratches the chin of the Pokémon. "Look at you, you're full of flowers! You look like a bouquet!"
The Pokémon releases a proud bark and rushes back to its trainer. Gladion wades through the flowers to reach Moon, who waves at him gently in surprise. He wonders how she's never surprised by his appearances when he's constantly stunned by hers. Maybe it's their way of striking a balance.
Moon lies down again. He sees a few Comfey spring out of the wild flowers in curiosity. "I thought you had work at the League today." He doesn't want to dive into why he knows this; he just does. "And you rarely take free days."
The Champion blinks one eye open. "Are you assuming they fired me?"
In the past, he would have stammered a response, but he knows the edge of her jokes too well to be appalled by them anymore. "Considering your last fight with Guzma nearly broke the dome of the League's facilities, I would understand."
Moon, completely unabashed by this, laughs freely. Her grin is childish. She has dimples, Gladion notices. "I needed a break today."
Gladion's eyes widen without his consent, and Moon goes back to blissful closed eyes and smiles. It's rare for Moon to admit she needs to rest, knowing how much of a workaholic she is (not like he's much better), so he briefly wonders if she's feeling alright.
Moon always looks alright, and her smile doesn't lie. Maybe this trip to the field is helping her relax, so he follows her steps and walks toward her to lie down on his back right by her side.
She's been careful to lie down on a place with no flowers to squash. He tucks that detail into his pocket and smiles gently as Silvally sits by him. She turns her head to him. Their shoulders are brushing and she's radiating a warmth he's tempted to inch closer to.
"What's the Aether President doing out of his office in a day as lovely as this?" she asks, breezy and calm. "Last time I took you out of that office it took me a malasada and a battle. What got you out this time?"
Wicke had. She had chased him around and frantically demanded he took a break from work or else, and Gladion is known for picking his battles very carefully; a battle with Wicke is one he would never win.
"I needed a break." He replies just as ambiguously as she did, earning a hum from her. "Don't you sometimes feel like the room wants you out of it as much as you want to leave?"
He refers to Wicke as 'the room' so Moon doesn't think he's any less proud than he's let her believe, but something in her appeased hum rings understanding and instantly distracts him. "Yeah. Kind of happened today at the League."
Gladion turns his head to her, realizing instantly that Moon is a little closer than he had bargained for. Or, at least, her eyes are a little too big from this meager distance and he's inclined to push her closer: if they're gonna be close, then they should be close and not teasingly close.
He's been feeling like this for a while. He wonders what's up with that.
There's a certain strain to her voice that pulls at his attention. "Are things hectic at the League?"
Moon shakes her head, looking back at the sky. The clouds are swirling around the meadow in a circle. Wingulls cross the sky under the sunlight. "Not really, I just didn't, um, feel comfortable there today. I felt like the place was swallowing me– it's complicated."
It's rare for Gladion to feel understood given how his life has turned out: not everyone gets to fix their family and run a whole company in the span of two months at best, and now that years have passed and Moon and him are good friends, he has to wonder what these words would have done to him in the past.
He wonders how things would have gone if he had met her right before he left his home.
"You can tell me about it if you want to." These are words he never thought he'd say, but he tells her that anyway.
Gladion knows how emotional Moon could get at times – he's seen her post-UB hunting, arguably at her worst – so he expects her to have a silent breakdown, or maybe be silent and mute it all until she's crying in his arms.
Instead, Moon laughs. Her body bobs up and down with her laughter. "It's fine. I think I simply needed to take a walk under the sunshine." Her voice turns gentler at the end, and her lips are drawn in a smile. "Sometimes, when I'm at the top of it all, I wonder what it feels like to go back to where it all began. Sometimes, I wanna go back to those times. Things seemed easier back then."
The word seem is very easy to play with, Gladion realizes. Things hadn't been complicated for her back then, but they had been a nightmare for him. She's now in the position of power and stress, and unlike him, she's got a whole region to defend with her soul and strength.
But Moon lies right by him. Small, human, made of flesh and bones and bathing under the sun like she's just another Pokémon enjoying the flowers.
"Things were… interesting, maybe," Gladion says, hesitating, and Moon hums in agreement. "We moved much more back then than now."
"We did. You were a criminal and I was a new, innocent trainer."
He narrows his eyes at the sky. "You've never been innocent."
She laughs again. Her voice bounces on the walls of the meadow. "I could never fool you, could I? That's a shame." Moon looks overjoyed about it, though. "It's just strange to know I can travel the whole world if I want to, you know. It's weird to know I could go anywhere I wanted now."
Cicadas cry in the distance under the summer sunshine.
"But you're still in Alola, aren't you?"
Moon hums and nods. "I am. When I first came here from Kanto I thought I would die before I got used to it all, but… now I can't imagine myself anywhere but here." Moon pats the ground beneath her in appreciation. The flowers bounce around her. "I want to explore what's outside the League's dome, someday. I just don't know when that day will come. I wonder if going elsewhere will take me back to when things were easier."
Looking at her, dressed in yellow and green and smiling like that, it's as though she's one with this meadow. Despite the feelings she's addressing, she seems happy, satisfied. Thankful.
Gladion doesn't realize he's staring at her from a side until she turns to him. "I wonder what other places there are like this meadow, but in other regions. I've read about so many things but I remember very few of them. The world seems so small, sometimes," Moon says, looking at the sky again, closing her eyes. "I wanna make a boat with sticks and go everywhere I can imagine."
And he's always known for her eyes to be set everywhere she looks, and that she could reach any place she desired if she put her heart into it.
Gladion wonders how far away from him that dream would place her. If her ambitions would someday push her away from him like the Alolan breezes carry the waves to the shore.
When he looks at the sky, though, he doesn't find himself stressed by it. Lying by her, surrounded by flowers and sleeping Pokémon, he can't help but wonder the many places he could go himself, and if he would find a secret heaven of his own.
He wonders how far he could travel and if he would ever get to touch the clouds and stars like he once longer, sitting with Silvally on his own, years ago.
But it's not a dream he wants to fulfill on his own anymore.
"We could travel together," he mumbles to nobody in particular. "Unova might be too urban for your taste."
"It's very pretty, though. I've seen pictures. It has very lush forests," Moon comments, airy and pleasant. "All places are pretty when you know where to look. I never thought I could find somewhere like that here in Alola when I first came here, but… look at us." Moon stretches an arm to the sun, as though she's attempting to encase it between her fingers. "We could go anywhere we wanted."
Her hand falls to the flowers and they fall silent.
It's not an awkward silence, the kind Gladion is accustomed to.
It's faint, pleasant, surrounded by the gentle summer breeze and the lull of the flowers brushing against each other. He can hear Comfeys cooing in the distance and Oricorio chanting to one another.
"Wherever you go," he whispers. Something on the ground is pulling him into a soothing, quiet daze, "we can go together. So things can be simple. For the both of us."
"I'd love that," he hears her say as his consciousness begins to fade. "I'd love that very much."
He doesn't realize he's holding her hand until he's dreaming of the many places he'd travel with her, hand in hand, walking everywhere they want, and without a care in the world.