Chapter Text
"Hop, please slow down!"
"I'm gonna be late!"
Hop sprints through the grass, breaking off the path and running to Mesagoza as fast as possible. It was the day he finally got to see inside his new school, and he couldn't be more excited to get there if he tried. He came to a halt at the giant doors to the city, bending down and panting as he waited for his mum to catch up.
"What are you in such a rush for?"
He half expects to already see his mum when he looks up, but instead finds a girl around his age leaning over him with a smile. She brushes a chunk of hair out of her face as Hop stands back up and responds.
"I'm seeing my new school today, and I'm already late, so I've really got to get outta here."
"Well, where's your school? Maybe i can help."
"In Mesagoza, right past those huge doors."
Her amber eyes light up and she clasps her hands together. "Oh my gosh, are you going to Naranja-Uva?!"
Hop nods, the girl glows. "I can't believe it, so am I!"
"Really?"
"Yes, really! Im in the Naranja dorms!"
"Wow, that's amazing!" Hop thinks for a moment before speaking again. "Hey, since we're gonna be class mates and all, would you want to walk there with me? i know it's not enough time to get to know each other, but maybe it would be fun? Plus make sure I don't get lost."
She puts a hand on her chin, thinking over the proposition. "Yeah, I don't have to be home anytime soon. Why not?"
She walks over and pulls open the huge door of Mesagoza and gestures for Hop to step in. He looks over his shoulder at his mum, who's still walking the path to catch up. He mouths "Sorry" before heading inside the city with the girl in tow.
Once they're both in the city, the girl sprints forward, spinning back to him and calling out. "I'll race you!"
Hop shakes his head. "Up all those stairs?! You're mad!"
She smiles and begins running straight through the city, giving Hop no choice but to sprint after her, trying to make up the ground she had on him. Every set of stairs makes him regret every choice that brought him here, but every stride that brought him closer to gaining on her made him push even harder until he winds up collapsed at the top of the stairs in absolute exhaustion. He rolls onto his back and shuts his eyes.
"Ow… Ow… why did we do that?"
The girl flops down next to him, holding her hands over her chest. "Fun?" She winces, Hop opens one eye and glances at the girl, who's looking at him with a wide smile.
"You're just whining cause you lost."
"Oh, shut it."
For a few moments, they just lay there, catching their breath and staring into the sky, before Hop sits up and offers her a hand. She takes his hand and pulls herself up, brushing her black hair behind her ears. Hop looks up and spots his mum on the previous staircase and waves down at her. She rolls her eyes and continues towards them.
She finally gets to the top of the stairs and huffs, looking at Hop sternly. "What was that about? How did you even make it up here so fast?"
Hop shrugs. "Running. I'm late y'know"
"I'm aware. Who is this?" His mum leans to look around him at the girl, they both stand and Hop speaks.
"This is my new friend…" He looks at her, now registering he never did ask her name. Luckily, she bounds over to his mum with a shine in her eyes.
"My name is Nemona, it's nice to meet you!"
His mum's eyes soften. "Nemona. Well, it's nice meeting you, but we aren't getting any less late sitting out here. She shoots a glare at Hop, who ducks his head and starts walking to the doors of the Academy. He looks over his shoulder and calls out to Nemona."It was great to meet you! Find me tomorrow!"
"I will! Wait, what's your name?!"
But before he could call back, he was walking into the empty lobby of Naranja-Uva. It feels like when he walked into a stadium for the first time, it's certainly matching up in size. Three stories lined with bookshelves stare him down as they walk forward and to a man with a purple and orange suit, who smiles and calls out to them.
"There you two are! I was starting to get worried you wouldn't show."
"I'm so sorry we're late. It's more tricky than I thought, navigating a new region. I've never really traveled before."
"It's quite alright, Miss. My day is just showing the six of you around for now."
Hop tilts his head and steps forward. "Six?" He looks around quizzically, the man chuckles in response.
"They're already upstairs, two other children and their guardians, all from Galar in fact."
Hop gives a mini gasp and looks between his mum and the man. "Wait, I'm not the only student from Galar? Is that a coincidence? Do I know them? Mum, do I know them?!" He grips her shoulders with a slight shake, she puts her hands on his with a laugh.
"Well there's only one way to find out, right? Maybe if you asked nicely Director Harrington will take you there."
Hop turns his pleading eyes to the man (Director?), clasping his hands together and putting his best convincing voice on. "Can I meet them? Pleaseee sir?"
"You're bound to meet them soon. I'll take you on a brief tour of some of the academy and then we can go up to my office."
Hop accepts this answer with a nod and follows Harrington up more stairs and all around the Academy. His eyes grew wide at every sight, to the point of having to restrain his excitement until after what felt like ages, they were headed for Harrington's office. He walks in with pep as he finally lays eyes on the other students; A blonde boy staring out the window and girl with black hair who watches him carefully. Unfortunately, he doesn't know either of them, but as it happens, he does know the adults with them. The other boy is sat next the the Chairman's assistant, Oleana, who's a real stickler from what he's heard from Lee, and the girl is next to Piers, who's a gym leader back home, and prickly in his own right. He couldn't be more excited if he tried. the moment Piers leaves his seat, Hop sits next to the girl and speaks eagerly.
"So you're a transfer from Galar too?" The girl nods, she seems to be looking him over. "That's great! What about you?" He looks expectantly at the boy, but is rudely ignored. He looks back to the girl. "Well, my name is Hop! What's yours?"
She sits to properly face him, then speaks. Her voice is pleasant and soft.
"My name is Marnie. You know, you look a lot like-"
Hop stops her there. He had certainly heard this one before. "Like Champion Leon? Yeah, that may be because he's my older brother. No big deal!"
Marnie nods in understanding. "That makes sense. You look a lot like him, so does your mum."
Hop responds. "And wasn't that the gym leader of Spikemuth back there? Is he your brother?"
She shrugs bashfully. "Yup. You got me."
"Wow, I can't believe we got shipped off to the same school! Can you believe it?" Hop looks back at the other boy. "Does that mean you're Oleana's younger brother? Is this school covered in famous siblings?"
That provokes a scoff out of the boy. "As if. We aren't related."
"So you do speak!" Hop turns back to Marnie. "Two out of three isn't bad though! We should stick together, what do you say, Marnie?"
She chuckles. "Sure, I don't see why not."
Hop wraps his arm around her shoulder in enthusiasm. "Yes! We're gonna make a great pair, mark my words. This is gonna be the first chapter in my legacy: 'Marnie and Hop, Legendary Rivals!' Working title, but you get it, yeah?"
"You're a real character, aren't you?"
"Well, I've got to be pretty great if I'm gonna beat Lee someday! And being in a whole new region is gonna provide a bunch of opportunities to get stronger, 'specially if I have an amazing rival like you!"
Marnie's cheeks get a twinge of pink. "Rival, hm? That mean you've got Pokemon?"
"Course i do." He moves back so he can dig through his bag, finding Wooloo's pokeball and hitting the button, releasing him from the ball. "What about you?"
She smiles and pulls her bag off her shoulders, searching through it until she finds a pokeball of her own and releases a Morpeko next to his Wooloo. Morpeko quickly locks his eyes on Wooloo and tackles him without hesitation. The two roll around in competition until they bump into the other boy, who recoils and glares harshly at the two trainers. Hop and Marnie share a laugh before calling back their Pokemon.
The adults return from Harrington's office, Harrington clears his throat and addresses the three children.
"Alright. now that all the formalities are out of the way, do you all want to see your dorms?"
Hop races over at that. "Yes, show me!" His mum shoots him a glare, he clears his throat and tries again. "Please, Director Harrington."
Harrington laughs and offers a key to Hop, which he grabs without hesitation. "Well, if the two of you wouldn't mind heading on your own for just a moment, Hop is placed in placed in a different section then the other two students with us, so I'd like to settle them in first, for efficiencies sake. I'll of course rejoin you as soon as possible."
Hop's mum nods, pulling out a school map from her pocket. "I think we can handle that, if you don't mind pointing me in the right direction."
"Of course, you two are headed to the Naranja side of the school, which means head to the right over-"
Piers leans over to look at the map, interrupting the pair. "Sorry, what's the difference between the two sides?"
Harrington looks over to Piers. "These days it's mostly aesthetics and minor curriculum differences, but back in the day Naranja-Uva academy was two separate schools, rival schools at that, who wound up coming together after decades of back and forth, to create this fine school we have today."
Piers backs off to Marnie's side, Hop gets an idea however. "So, since we're in different sides of the schools, we three are automatically rivals?"
Marnie shrugs. "Sounds right to me."
Harrington speaks thoughtfully. "That's one way to look at it. We do occasionally use it to decide teams in school activities."
Hop shoots Marnie a look before following his mum out of the room and towards the Naranja dorms
"186, 187, 188, aha, 189!"
Hop bounds over to his door and swiftly unlocks the door, shoving it open dramatically and stepping in.
"Check it out, mum!"
He walks in the room, spinning round and round in an attempt to memorize every inch. He stops with a shake of his head and rushes over to the wardrobe and desk, pulling open every drawer in relentless curiosity.
"There's already a bunch of uniforms in here, are they mine?"
He grabs one down and holds it to himself, turning to his mum. His mum is watching him with tears in her eyes, hand over her mouth in an attempt to keep her composure. Hop's smile drops and he tosses the uniform to his bed, walking over to her.
"Hey, what's wrong? Are you alright?"
She wraps her arms around him in a tight hug, he hugs her back without hesitation.
"I can't believe I'm not going to see you every day anymore. I'm gonna miss you so much." She cups his face in her hands. "But I can already tell you'll be so happy here. Don't you ever forget how proud of you we all are of you for getting here, me, your grandparents, Leon. We're all right behind you, you know that? Even regions away, I promise any one of us would drop anything for you."
"Don't say that, you're gonna make me cry…"
"Well it's true." She rubs his own tears away with her thumbs "I love you. If you ever need anything, absolutely anything, just let me know and I'll be here."
"I know. I love you too, mum. And I'm gonna miss you guys too. You better make sure Lee doesn't get off easy without me to keep him check, yeah? He's gotta visit you twice as often since I wont be there to keep you company." He takes a step back with a chuckle.
"You know it. Me and Sonia will drag him down every spare moment."
A knock at the door catches his attention, and Harrington hesitantly cracks the door open. "Terribly sorry, am i interrupting?"
Hop rubs his eyes aggressively and turns away, his mum chuckles.
"Just getting a little overwhelmed at the end here. Should i?" She motions to step outside, he nods and holds it open for her.
Hop huffs and shakes his head. He had gotten so close to not crying through this, and she had to get him right at the end? He heads towards the door to find the two, but is stopped when he hears the conversation between his mum and Harrington.
"I know we discussed it before… about the bullying? I just want to be sure he won't go through the same…"
Hop stops listening there. His face gets very hot as he slinks away from the door.
"Oh, mum…"
He had hoped that his… issues with his last school wouldn't be the first thing his director knew about him, but whatever. She's worried, he gets it. It's not like he isn't worried, he just wanted to move past everything, not be looked over all the time. He can handle himself. He sits on bed dejectedly until his mum comes back, which is when he sits back up with a small smile.
She takes a breath and opens her arms for another hug, which Hop obliges. "I guess this is it, huh?"
"Guess so. Well I meant everything i said earlier. I'm gonna miss you."
"I'll miss you too. You better call all the time between classes, alright?"
He pulls away so he can nod, she puts her hands together. "Goodbye, Hop."
"Bye, mum."
She slowly makes her way out of the dorm, and Hop's eyes are drawn back to Harrington. He had kind of forgotten he was standing there, which wasn't helping his embarrassment. Harrington smiles and speaks.
"I'll be leaving you to get settle in now, but the last thing I'll ask you is to come by my office tomorrow, after your classes."
Hop smiles. "Aw, am i in trouble already? That may be a new record for me."
"Not quite. Let's call it a surprise, shall we? I'll take my leave now. I hope you'll enjoy your time here."
Hop nods as Harrington heads out as well, letting out a breath. Man, he was still beat from all that touring and that race. He flops onto his bed, nudging the discarded uniform aside and closing his eyes. He wondered about Nemona. He really wanted to see her tomorrow, better yet, he wanted to battle her tomorrow. She's the type to stand out of a crowd, so he's sure they'll run into another. Now he just needs to figure out what strategy to use against her…