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It had been two weeks since he broke the news. Though he had been contemplating about it for a while, Gabe finally decided that he would begin his new journey alongside Growlithe. As expected, Cassie didn’t take it well. It slowly transitioned every now and then from crying, to support, to asking him not to leave and every attempt was a bit more salt rubbing into his wounds. As much as he didn’t want to leave behind his childhood friend, he understood that at the moment, they had different aspirations. While he had dreamed of learning everything he could about the world and it’s pokemon, Cass’s approach was to do her learning from her own family. At first he tried thinking of how he could ease her into the idea. With small mentions of the idea slipping every now and then, and her playing it off as wishful thinking, he had hoped it wouldn’t hurt as much when he told her he was going through with it.
Even with time passing, Gabe had been racking his brain for ideas on what he could do for Cassie before he left until he noticed a small festival would be passing through. Though the two of them had been a bit rocky in these past two weeks, Cass was absolutely ecstatic to be invited out. Even as he had to go through his father and his Haxorus, Gabe was thankful that her scary faced older brother wasn’t around to threaten to follow them around for the rest of the night. Along with a promise to keep her safe and a decent time to be home, the pair decided to get a move on while the evening was still young.
“Cass.”
Gabe’s walking slowed, and he couldn’t bring himself to look up at her. He could feel her gaze on him and tried to summon his strength,
“I’ve made up my mind. I’m going to leave in the morning.”
As much as he tried to find some way to explain his feelings, nothing else seemed to be coming out. He braced himself for impact, unsure of what he should expect. Instead, he felt a small hand embrace his own. Though their pace had obviously slowed, he looked down at Cass now clinging to his arm, and tried to read her face.
“I…I know I’ve been trying to tell you to stay but…”
Her voice began to break, and almost instinctively Gabe turned around and pulled her in closely to his chest. It caught her off guard, and she could feel the tears start falling as she returned his embrace.
“I’m really sorry Gabe, I’ve been really selfish.”
Gabe smiled a bit and placed a hand her head.
“We’re all a little selfish from time to time, it’s okay. I’m really happy to know you care so much though.”
He bent down a bit to be even at her eye level and tried to move her hands away from her face.
“Come on now, we still have a whole night ahead of us. Let’s see a smile.”
Though she was still a bit emotional and wiping away her tears, a small smile still managed to make its way to her face.
“There we go.” Smiling again, Gabe grabbed hold of her hand and the two began making their way to the festival again. “I promise I’ll get you something good from the festival to keep you company when I’m not around, okay?” A small nod was all he got in return, but it was enough to make him determined to find the perfect gift for her.
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Finally making their way to the festival, Cassie’s mood and expression immediately brightened. With the large crowd of both people and pokemon, various booths full of food, games and prizes, it was hard to have any lingering moods that were anything less than happy. Grabbing hold of his hand a bit tighter, the couple ran around examining the marvels of the festival. One of Cass’s favorites of the night though, had to be the small band of Pikachu who did a small dance in accompaniment to t heir trainer’s drum beats. Whenever he could, Gabe would often look down at Cassie as if to burn her smile into his head. He was mentally kicking himself for being so dramatic, since he knew he would often come back to visit as well as help out back home, but it was still always a nice sight.
“Hey, look over there!” Cass’s attention pointed to a sign that simply said “Catch the Carp!” with a small Magikarp showing on the bottom of it. “It says here that there’s a super special kind in the pond?”
The pair walked over to the small crowd gathered around a pond with a single man calling out into a megaphone, “Come one, come all to have a shot at one of the most wonderous pokemon around~!”
Cass looked up to Gabe with her face practically beaming, though he couldn’t help but furrow his brow a bit. “What’s so special about Magikarp? Aren’t they fairly common?”
“Come on Gabe, you should give it a shot! I’m not sure what makes it so special, but there’s no harm in trying to find out!” With Cass dragging him along to the entrance of the pond anyway, he gave a small sigh but continued to follow.
“One try please!” The man with the megaphone happily took the money and handed the young girl a fishing rod, though she immediately handed it over to Gabe with a large smile. “I wish you the best of luck sir!”
He sat at the edge of the pond, taking a quick glance at the pond, Gabe tried to figure out what exactly made each of these Magikarp different from the others.
“Psst, Gabe. Are you gonna give it a shot?” Not realizing that he had been examining the pond for a few minutes now, he straightened up at Cass’s voice. “OH. Uh, yeah. Sorry.” From the corner of his eye, he could have sworn he saw a glimmer in the water. It seemed that everybody was expecting him to give it an actual shot, so he grabbed the lure and aimed it where he thought the shine had come from.
Though it had taken a few minutes of anticipation, Gabe finally managed to get a bite on his line. Cass jumped up almost immediately, though she covered her mouth in hopes of not scaring off the pokemon. Gabe leaned forward, trying to remember the best times to reel in and back off the line for a bit. After what seemed like forever, a smaller-than-average Magikarp made its way above the water and into Gabe’s arms. To his surprise, and the surprise of the now cheering crowd in the background, this Magikarp was a shining golden color and Gabe was taken back.
“So that’s what they meant by special Magikarp…” he mumbled to himself, before feeling Cass nearly knock him over in excitement.
“You did it Gabe! Everyone is so happy for you!!” The man on the megaphone had seemed to be talking for a while, but Gabe was stuck in his own head for a bit before the man asked for a photo of him and his new catch. Gabe held the Magikarp in his hands with Cass at his side, with some fairly large smiles all around. After being given a Premier Ball to place his Magikarp in, Gabe finally put the poor Pokemon that had been out of water for so long into its new home.
With the nighttime suddenly surrounding them, the pair decided to begin making their way back home. It was once again nice for Gabe to see Cass in such high spirits. She grabbed on to his arm and leaned against him as they walked, earning a small blush from the taller boy as he looked away.
“Thank you for today Gabe. I’m glad we got to make these memories before you left.”
He stopped in his tracks, startling Cassie, and rummaged through his bag, grabbing hold of the premier ball from before.
“I almost forgot! I…. want you to have this Magikarp. I know you have your family around as well as Vibrava…” ‘But I want you to think of me often.’ It was too embarrassing for him to say out loud, no matter how much he wanted to. Before he could start again, Cass tackled him over with an overexcited hug, ending up with both of them actually falling onto the ground on top of Gabe.
“I’ll be sure to take good care of it. When you come back to see me, you’ll hardly recognize it!” Once again, tears started falling, though her smile never left her face.
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It was a bit before the sun came up that Gabe decided to go. He called out his partner Growlithe, and nodded at him. He couldn’t take another lasting goodbye, and he decided to leave before she had gotten the chance to miss him, though he knew that was mostly wishful thinking.
Walking a bit farther out of town when he decided to rummage through his bag for his picture from last night. He gave a soft smile seeing it again, knowing he’d probably come back sooner than he needed to. Turning around the picture, he noticed a small note that he hadn’t noticed before.
“I’ll be waiting! xoxo – Cass ❤”
It was finally his turn to feel emotional, though he wondered how she had managed to slip in that note without him knowing. Quickly removing his glasses to wipe his face, he looked at Growlithe and laughed.
“Please don’t tell her about this.”
Getting a soft but understanding yelp in reply, the pair continued towards their new adventures.