The Trainer Life

You stretch, arching your back to give Dale a good view of your chest. "So!" you continue. "What brings you to Route One?"

"We're not on Route One," he says. "Route One is that way. I'm between routes. Off-route hunting takes more work, but I heard it's a good way to find rare pokemon. I need a little more variety before I do the Rainbow Badge."

You nod. Off-route hunting is a thing? And which one is the Rainbow Badge, again? You'll look it up later. "Oh! That explains it!" you lie.

"Mmhm," Dale nods. "How about you? Heading to Viridian City?"

"Yeah!" you nod. "That and... just sort of generally exploring."

"I see how it is," Dale grins. "Early days, no plan, doing random stuff to see what works. Crawling into people's tents for midnight snuggles. Can't blame you, really."

"They will know me as... the Midnight Snuggler!" you declare.

"I've seen worse screen names," he nods. "Hey, want to travel with me for a bit? Maybe I can find you a nice pokemon?"

"I'm... um, out of pokeballs," you admit. "I sort of filled up on Rattatas."

"I can spot you one pokeball," he offers. "What do you say?"

"Sure!" you agree. Your mom would be proud -- she told you just yesterday that this sort of thing could happen.

She might not be proud of you breaking into his tent near-naked at midnight. If you talk to her, you'll leave that part out.

"Oh!" Dale adds. "For the picture, how naked do you want to be?"

Oh. Oh, right. Victory pictures. You suppose Dale does get one of those.

Part of you wants to have the covers pulled up to your neck. Being in Dale's bedroll should be proof enough of a victory. On the other hand, it was really good sex. Doesn't he deserve a photo of some boobs? At least?

You settle for a photo of you in his lap, with the covers around your waist. Both of you are topless. You flash a V sign for the camera, and Dale uploads it to his profile. You change your screen name, and he tags you @MidnightSnuggler.

Travel with Dale turns out to not be as fun as you hoped. Traveling off-route means fighting through brush and shrubs and steep slopes and prickle bushes. His Ivysaur helps open a path through the greenery, but it's far from as easy as Route One.

You send your Pidgey up to hunt for interesting pokemon, trusting Dale to handle any pokemon that attack while Pidgey is out. After about half an hour, it comes back and excitedly leads you to a Pikachu. Between Dale's Ivysaur and one of your Rattatas, you catch it easily. Then Dale takes you back to Route One.

He offers a hug as you leave. "Keep in touch, Hazel!" he says. "I'll be watching your progress!"

You wince ever so slightly. "I... hope you don't mind seeing me lose a lot!" you admit. "But I'll be watching you as well!"

"You'll do great!" he answers. "I know it!"

And he steps back into the brush and leaves you alone.

You take your time getting to Viridian City.

The trainer life suits you, you think. If you'd tried climbing into someone's bedroll back in Pallet Town, he would've had questions like "shouldn't you be properly dressed?" and "let's plan a dinner date for Wednesday" and "when you get married, how many children do you want?".

Or, more likely, "how did you get into my house?" and "I'm monogamous with my girlfriend, could you leave please?"

With Dale, he mostly just asked if you were on birth control. Which you are, obviously. You're never sure quite how well your mom knows you, but she took you to get one of the fancy contraceptive implants early, so clearly she has at least a suspicion about your outlook on boys.

Or maybe it was just a coincidence. That's... possible.

You walk back and forth across Route One, beating up pokemon for levels. There doesn't seem to be much here but birds and rats. It's fine that there aren't any exciting pokemon, since you're out of pokeballs anyway, but it does mean you're going to need to move on soon. In the meantime, you try to give most of the battle experience to Squirtle and Pidgey and Pikachu, since your Rattata army is probably getting replaced soon.

It's getting on toward afternoon when you spot another trainer.