Work Text:
Thinking Of You
Well, this wasn’t good. Ash peered around as he turned in a slow circle. The trees he saw were unfamiliar - odd considering he trained in this forest all the time. He'd lost the trail again.
That was what happened when you went away for months and came back to an old place. Things changed. In this case, a series of summer storms had knocked down trees, making the trail difficult in some spots and impassable in others.
If only Gary was here.
He’d had a few little adventures with his old friend and they had never gotten lost like this with Gary leading the way. The researcher had a way of looking at the sky to find the right direction. He'd explained it a few times but Ash always forgot.
Sorcery , Ash called it. Gary always rolled his eyes at that…
Ash could just about hear the unamused huff and Gary’s voice repeating for the hundredth time, " it's literally just looking at the sun's position, Ash."
A pang went through Ash, twisting at his insides and clawing at his heart.
Damn he missed that snarky pain in the ass.
– – –
Heavy pants fell from Gary as he hauled himself up the final stretch off a climb that should have been far easier. He sat at the edge of the cliff he had been climbing for the better part of an hour as he caught his breath. The muscles in his arms and shoulders burned, but he'd made it without incident.
One of the pokeballs on his belt wiggled insistently and Gary gave it a reassuring pat. Arcanine always worried about him. It made him think of another pokemon - one that wasn't his, but always crawled up on his shoulder with a concerned coo whenever he showed signs of slowing down.
He smiled wistfully as he looked out over the land below him, wondering what Ash and Pikachu were up to right now. Training or eating, knowing Ash. He wished Ash had been able to tag along on this trip, but this particular island was off limits to all but the best field researchers.
His stomach did the same little flip it always did when he thought of Ash and he sighed, climbing back to his feet. He always missed Ash, and wished like hell that they could travel together - be together - always.
But they couldn’t.
Their paths were different, even when they were literally walking on the same tail in some forest or field somewhere. As much as his heart longed for the other man, he loved his career and wouldn’t trade it for anything.
He could never ask Ash to give up his passion, and so he would have to settle for missing his friend, because that was all it could ever be.
– – –
He was lost again. He wasn’t even surprised this time, but at least Ash now knew how to find his way. It turned out Gary had only needed to demonstrate his sorcery one hundred and five times for Ash to understand it. And then the asshole intentionally got them lost and made Ash find their way back to the trail without giving him an ounce of help.
It only took two hours for Ash to do it, but at least he’d figured it out.
Pikachu tapped the rim of Ash’s hat and pointed to their left. The sun hadn’t quite risen to its highest point yet, so it was still in the east, which was left. They needed to go south which meant…
Ash faced the sun and thought back to the little saying that told the order of the directions. “Never eat spinaraks or weedles,” he murmured, pointing in front of him at eat . South was to his right, he deduced.
“Keep track of the sun,” Gary’s voice echoed in his mind.
They headed in that direction, careful to keep the sun on their left side as they stepped around trees and climbed over logs.
It wasn’t long before the trees started to grow closer together. That meant they were likely on the right track: the lake they were heading to was past a section of dense woods. It took some time and a few instances of backtracking to keep the sun to their left, but Ash and Pikachu eventually found themselves stepping out of the trees and into a clearing. The glass-like surface of a vast lake spread towards the horizon a short distance ahead.
The sun was now at its peak, but there were three mountain tops visible from the lake shore and the largest was to the east, according to the map. Ash eyed them briefly. The tallest peak was to their left, just where it should have been, albeit closer than expected - he’d gotten further off the trail than he thought.
It had worked.
Thanks, Gary , he thought, wishing that his friend could be there to see his accomplishment.
It was a small accomplishment, considering all the things they had both done over their lives, but Ash knew Gary would be looking at him with that smile if he were there. That soft smile that Ash had never seen him give anyone else… The smile that told him his feelings were mutual.
He couldn’t wait to see Gary again.
– – –
Adrenaline rushed through Gary’s veins, propelling him forward through the battle until Blastoise delivered the decisive blow. Elation ran through him as his opponent - another former rival and old friend who always made him think of Ash - recalled his fallen pokemon. The connection wavered at the thought of Ash and the adrenaline was replaced with a wave of vertigo strong enough for him to stumble backwards.
Arcanine’s large, strong form behind him kept him from falling and Umbreon added support from beside him. His vision swayed briefly as his starter resumed his usual form, but for the first time since learning Mega-Evolution, he didn’t faint at the end of the battle. It was a good thing, it meant his body was getting used to accessing this sort of energy.
Another energy surrounded him, encasing him in warmth as his friend crossed the battlefield. His pokemon’s healing energy faded after a moment.
"Thanks, Hatterene."
She only scowled at him before returning herself to her pokeball at his belt. Her annoyance with him was palpable even through the pokeball.
It wasn’t the first time one of his pokemon had given him a hard time, and it wouldn't be the last - not with the way his team had picked up his own stubbornness. She had, however, proven to be his most difficult pokemon to work with, especially lately. It reminded him a bit of Ash with his Charizard.
Just as Charizard had picked up on Ash’s insecurities and inexperience, Hatterene was picking up on something within Gary. Something that had been becoming more of a strain over the last few years since he and Ash had entered adulthood.
"Why is she so annoyed with you?"
Gary shrugged his shoulders. He knew the answer, but Goh didn't need to know how it always felt like a piece of his heart was missing. Someone was missing from this adventure… from any adventure that Ash missed out on.
– – –
This adventure was different. Weird, actually. Ash had felt off the entire time, as though he were enshrouded by some heavy fog. He had a hard time focusing because his mind had latched onto the man that had slowly become his most steady human companion.
It was the first time in months that he wasn’t traveling with Gary. They’d been spending more time together than ever, partly because Ash kept inviting himself along on Gary’s research trips, but this time Ash was heading to a competition in Alola while Gary had a conference in Hoenn to attend.
There was no way around them being separated, which sucked because of a particular little detail that had come up since the last time they were apart. They were together now.
Somehow the days of traversing the wilds in search of powerful pokemon and the nights spent in a cramped tent had culminated in… this. It had been a stormy night in the Orange Islands when Gary had met his eyes over the solar powered lantern in their tent and declared, “ I’m tired of missing you all the time .”
Ash had known about Gary’s feelings for years - almost as long as he had known about his own feelings for the researcher. But acting on those feelings had always been hard, even for someone who wore their heart on their sleeve, like Ash did. And now they were apart again and Ash couldn’t get him out of his mind.
The problem was, they would be apart for a while. Gary would be heading back to Sayda Island for his annual Aerodactyl fix after his conference and Ash had a competition in Unova once he was done in Alola. They had separate plans after that.
Who knew when they would see each other again.
It was that thought that kept rearing up in Ash’s mind, throwing him off his game badly enough that the match commentators had been speculating about it non-stop. The people of Alola seemed concerned about their champion's performance but Ash couldn’t find the energy to care too much. He was too distracted by this empty feeling inside.
He knew it was time to do something different when he was knocked out barely into the semi finals, far sooner than anyone had expected. A text message came through not long after the final battle.
- You're off your game. Are you okay? -
Gary’s concern was what made him decide to withdraw from the next competition and fly to Hoenn the very next day. Why battle when his heart was elsewhere? There would always be another competition, but there was only one Gary.
He finally caught up with Gary outside of the conference venue - and felt a jolt in his stomach when he finally locked eyes with the researcher. The surprise on Gary’s face alone was almost enough to make the expensive last minute flight worthwhile.
Ash met his boyfriend’s eyes with a smile.
"Yeah, so… I'm tired of missing you all the time too."
– – –
For once, Gary didn’t feel the hollow pang of missing someone while traveling.
Ash had tagged along to Sayda after that surprise in Hoenn and, though it took some time, they'd worked out a system.
They planned together, finding the most overlap between Ash’s training and Gary’s research. The frustration of having just missed seeing the other by a day or two was no more - their trips overlapped perfectly. Gary having a longer project somewhere just meant Ash had more time to do whatever training thing that would have drawn him away from Gary anyway. Anytime Ash’s adventures lasted longer than Gary’s, it just meant that he had an opportunity to add in an extra adventure by catching up with Ash wherever he was.
These days the ache of the distance was just that - an ache, not a horrible twisting of the gut or a stab through the heart. It was only an ache because the distance was only physical now.
Ash was never truly far, no matter how Gary itched to feel the warmth of his arms and the affection of his kisses. The constant back and forth of text messages and photos of magnificent views and pokemon gave them something to hold on to, even when the distance was vast and signal was spotty. There was still worry, and there was still a background sort of loneliness when the time between messages stretched longer than they liked, but knowing that they would be together soon made up for it.
How could he possibly feel as though something was missing when Ash was constantly there?