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In Lunick’s defense, it had been a completely innocent question, one born out of genuine curiosity. Being willing to answer the question himself, he hadn’t thought it would elicit any sort of negative response. Snuggled up after a long day on the clock, back in his room on his bed that really wasn’t made for two people, Solana had been wrapped around him like a Komala, finally warmed from her evening patrol.
The second the question had come out of his mouth, she shot away from him, rolling over onto her other side, hands covering her face. In the sudden movement, poor Plusle had to jump over onto Lunick’s stomach to keep from falling off the bed.
“You’re not allowed to ask that!” she said, voice up an octave…or two.
Replaying the conversation, he scoured every word, trying to figure out what he had asked that would get a reaction like that.
“When did you realize you liked me?”
The implication being, when did she realize she had a romantic interest in him?
Their relationship was still relatively new, and it wasn’t something he had asked, or figured out at that point, so he felt it was a fair question. Nothing he could think of would make the question itself bad…
Which meant, the question wasn’t bad. Not in the slightest.
It meant her answer was bad.
He refrained from laughing, moving both their partner pokemon off of him, the two squeaking to themselves in something of a laugh as they hopped off the bed, to resume their own cuddle pile over on the chair.
“Now I gotta know,” he teased, rolling over onto his side to spoon her.
She shook her head. “Nope,” she said, voice still muffled from her hands.
He laughed as she adjusted herself so he could at least get his arm under her neck to be more comfortable. “I mean, you don’t have to tell me, but I’m not trying to embarrass you.”
She grumbled, reaching down to her stomach to grab his hand, unable to come up with a response.
Stars above did he want to know. Never before had he wanted the answer to something so badly in his life– but again, he wouldn’t pressure her.
“One more and I promise I’ll completely drop it– but can I guess?” he asked.
She jerked against him, smothering her own laugh. “Good luck.”
He hummed, thinking back on the progression of their relationship. He knew it was safe to say they had been dancing around things since their encounter with Groudon, so it stood to reason that she would have felt something at least before that.
“Around the time we stopped Gordor?” he asked.
She shook her head. “Before then,” she answered.
Prior to that still left an entire year and a half of knowing one another.
“Go-Rock Base?” he asked.
When she shook her head again, it surprised him, which he just as quickly figured maybe it shouldn't. Just because it was then that he fully realized didn’t mean it would have been the same for her.
“While in hindsight I can think of other instances where I probably should have realized that I had romantic feelings for you, it was definitely the Go-Rock Base mission that I knew.”
She breathed a laugh, squeezing his hand. “Of course it was,” she teased.
He laughed in turn, pulling back from her to the other edge of the bed. “What’s that supposed to mean?” he asked, watching as she turned to face him.
Her cheeks were still dusted with color. “Because of course it was! Of course it was this whole climatic moment. Let me guess: you were scared that I was alone in the base?” she asked.
He nodded. “Terrified– Joel had barely assigned me to the mission before I was out the door.”
She nodded in turn. “Exactly– and let me guess: you were beating yourself up until the very second we found each other.”
He nodded again, wanting to laugh because, of course she knew him like that. Of course he didn’t have to tell her any of what he had been saying to himself– she knew him. “I kept saying that if anything had happened to you, I wouldn’t forgive myself for not finding you soon enough, and something about that made me realize that my worry for you was different than my worry for Spenser or– literally anyone else.”
It had been a long time since that mission, and while he never doubted her own prowess for even a second, it hadn’t stopped him from worrying then, and it didn’t stop him from having the occasional “what if I didn’t make it in time” nightmare. He woken from such a nightmare only a few weeks prior. It didn’t matter that the Quads were on their side now –at least as close as they were going to be. He was always going to worry about her.
Her lips pulled back into a wry grin. “See, again: yours was sweet. Yours was charming– because of course it was. It’s you.”
He supposed he would take the compliment.
“Mine, on the other hand, was not. Mine was anything but cute or sweet– it was stupid and I was so mad at myself…” she grumbled, and from over at the chair, Plusle definitely made a squeak that was a laugh.
“I bet it was sweet. You’re just being hard on yourself,” he tried to soothe, hoping it would prompt her to finally tell him.
She took a deep breath, seeming to steady herself. “Fine–” She paused again.
He reached out for her, hand resting on her hip, but said nothing, only allowing her time to gather her thoughts, or more likely her nerve.
“Do you remember– When I had that month-long detail in Fall City…”
He thought back on it, trying to remember when that had been. The last time she had an assignment that long in Fall City…after she had started, when she was one of a handful of rangers who weren’t tasked to investigate into the Go-Rock Squad because of her low rank…
Color returned to her cheeks the second he started to grin.
“Solana– that was–”
“I know,” she said, looking anywhere but at him.
He could barely withhold a laugh. “Babe– that was barely three months into you being a ranger–”
“I know!” she interrupted. “Like I said, I was very mad at myself. Disappointed even, because I had promised myself I wouldn’t.”
“That you wouldn’t fall for anyone, or that you wouldn't fall for me?” he asked. Neither answer would upset him, if anything, it was going to amuse him further. He had spent so long convinced she wouldn't even give him the time of day, romantically, so learning that she had feelings far longer than him…?
“Both,” she answered with a shrug. “But more specifically you.” She reached out to tap his nose. “Union Poster Boy,” she teased.
At that, he laughed. Full-heartedly. It had been a while since he had been called that, but he knew exactly what she had meant.
When she had first started, he had been a bit of a poster boy. The face of The Ranger Union after they had taken a lot of bad PR blows.
He had already earned a lot of trust in RingTown, and so that combined with his skills in general, and “classic good looks” [whatever any of it meant] left his face…well known. Lots of PR work to help The Union recover from all the mess that they later learned were all attributed to the Go-Rock Squad trying to sow distrust in the rangers.
Up until Solana had saved the region from Gordor’s terror, he was probably as close to a celebrity the region had.
He didn’t necessarily blame her for not wanting to fall for him.
“I can’t tell you how many times I said to Plusle how I wasn’t here to date– I was here to do a job and chase my dream of being a ranger…then one day you just…threw all of that out the window,” she said, finally looking back at him.
He felt his heart skip a beat at the admission. “Do I get to know how?” he asked.
Plusle laughed again, letting him know it was going to be good whatever it was.
Solana sat up on her elbow to point at her pokemon. “If you don’t stop you little traitor–” she threatened, only earning herself another laugh, this time from both their pokemon.
Lunick laughed, reaching out to pull her back to him. “C’mon, tell me,” he said with a laugh.
She eased back down next to him, but the color had yet to leave her cheeks. “...Remember when I saw you for the first time since leaving RingTown?”
He was about to say no, but caught himself at the very last second, the memory of that morning coming back to him with a vengeance. Not just the morning– the smell he realized he had finally forgotten about.
The second he snorted a laugh, she smacked his chest, burying her face under his chin. “I told you it was stupid!” she grumbled.
He kept laughing. “No, no, there’s no way– Solana, you are lying!” he said. “There is no way I said anything to make you even like me as a friend in that moment!” To the best of his memory, he had botched every word to her that morning…
She pulled back enough to not muffle her voice. “Told you I was disappointed in myself,” she said with a laugh.
“I don’t believe you,” he said, sitting up next to her.
She mirrored him, pulling her hair over her shoulders. “Do you really think I would lie about that? Because– yeah– you didn’t say anything good that morning, but damn if you weren’t trying.” Her shoulders fell as she looked over to their pokemon. “I hadn’t seen you in over a month, and of course it was the morning after Aria and I were tangling with Grimer and Muk over at the waterworks. Of course it was the morning the two of us smelled absolutely rank because that last Muk was just angry and gross– So nasty we probably made Skuntank smell sweet–” She shook her head at the memory. Anytime she thought about it too hard, she was positive she could still smell it. “And of course you just had to be downwind of the two of us…and you were trying so hard to not offend either of us– and I don’t know. You were trying so hard, and you were just…painfully sweet even as you basically ran away from the two of us as you promised to take over city patrol–”
“In my defense–!” he started, but just as quickly deflated, getting a laugh from her. “I don’t think I really had one…think I just knew I was digging my own grave and needed to stop.”
She smiled at him, soft and warm, hands falling into her lap. “At least I got to hear Aria laugh for the first time.” A laugh so genuine, it had taken Solana by surprise. Even more so when Aria had said his reaction was almost worth getting covered in grime, and pulled her along so they could give Joel their reports and then burn their uniforms.
He grinned. “I mean, hey, if I’m good for nothing else, I’m at least good for a laugh.”
She rolled her eyes at him, reaching out to pull him closer, placing a soft kiss on his cheek, a part of her still unused to being able to freely do so after years of repressing the feeling. “You’re good for at least a few other things,” she teased.
“Wordsmith must be among my talents because clearly I said something good that day,” he teased, earning himself another shove.
Swinging her legs off the bed, she looked around the floor for wherever she had discarded her coat. “You coming with me to grab something to eat, or are you content to lay here and revel in how much of a sucker I am?” she asked.
He slid off the other side, grabbing a coat of his own off the chair, careful to not disturb their pokemon. “I think I can manage both,” he said.
At her side, he kissed her cheek, laughing as he did so.
Grabbing his hand, she could only bring herself to pull him along, not trusting herself to say anything else stupid for the night…