“Birthday, actually. Twenty-sixth of July,” he began with a quirky little grin on his face, before quickly catching the box and gently shaking it just in case there was something fragile in it. “Wait, don’t tell me you just—“ he trailed off, his eyebrows going up as he slowly shredded the paper off the box and eventually revealed its contents.

A brand-spanking-new Pokédex that came along with an additional watch add-on. And it was even in a nice, trendy black-and-red color, to boot.

“You literally did not just—“ he began to stammer again, peeling off the tape and gently removing the Pokédex from the packaging, along with the watch that came with it. “I—“ he continued to blurt out, blinking. Hell, these looked pretty expensive.

He was actually itching to ask the other how much this was, but instead decided to keep his silence and then powered the Pokédex on to check if all the data he’d gotten from his journey back then was in here as well. To his surprise, everything was there—starting from the very first entry up to the latest one; when he’d whipped out the thing again while searching for a damned Beldum.

“Well then,” he began some time later, pocketing the Pokédex and slipping the watch on his right hand, looking at the way it caught the light. “Let’s get going, I don’t know how many people are going to be helping out at the nearby orchards today, don’t want to risk running around with so many others crowding for the same thing… like, I know the pay’s ridiculously cheap, and our companions can get free snacks along the way but yeah… let’s go?” he continued, heading off towards the orchards at the outskirts of the city.

“By the way… th—thanks,” he added a few moments later, hoping to keep the awkward silence at bay. Damn.

Thankfully they’d both managed to avoid the potentially awkward silence; more so on Lars’ part. He didn’t know why, but there was something…something that was bothering him. It was like an itch he couldn’t bear to scratch the hell away, at least for the moment. “Hopefully this won’t take too long,” he added a few moments later, silently taking a note to look for something for Leon later in the day once they were done.

All too soon they’d eventually reached the orchard, with a gaudy-looking, festive banner proclaiming the activity name for the day. Sponsored by the local pharmacy, the staff needed as many hands as possible so that they could continue making the secret handmade remedies that they’d been up to for the past few generations. Once he’d approached and inquired about what they had to do, he eventually returned with a bunch of baskets in one arm.

“Still need lots of people, they said. A couple basketful of Berries should do the trick, and they’re looking for people who’re willing to go further out the back of the orchards since that’s where some of the better ones are. Although we’ve been warned that there’re wild Pokémon out further back… must be why they asked us to bring some companions along,” he said once he’d returned before passing the other basket to Leon before digging around his pockets and eventually pulling out a folded camo hat and perching it…as best as he could manage on his head.

“What? I can’t flatten my bangs for this,” he added a few moments later, resisting the urge to break out into laughter.

“A ploy to…what?” he began curiously, blinking in Leon’s direction before the other broke down into a maniacal fit of the giggles with what he was trying to do.

“I highly doubt there’s going to be photos of today, I mean have you seen—“ he began to insist, when right then and there one of the local pharmacy staff who just happened to be one of the official ‘event’ photographers snapped a candid picture of the two of them—which mostly consisted of Leon trying to tussle with the camo hat on Lars’ head—before they walked away.

It took a few moments for Lars to realize that he’d heard the soft clicking of a camera before turning to face where he thought he’d heard the sound coming from—but there was nobody there.

“Well now you’ve gone and done it,” he muttered with a bit of a grumpy tone in his voice—he was pretty certain the pictures would get out sometime in the future, but how soon he had no idea! Either way, he then pointed out to the furthest berry patches he could see, before heading off in that direction.

“Oh, with me? Some of the younger ones… I’m pretty sure you haven’t met them yet. I have a Litwick, a Scyther and a… well I’m pretty sure you’re going to lose it if I told you I have a Noibat with me,” he answered casually, tilting the camo hat on his head a little more to the side so it still hung onto his head without falling off. “I hope we don’t encounter anything out here, because that would be a bit of a stretch…” he added a few moments later, secretly hoping that this would go off without a hitch and be peaceful on the most part.

Several minutes of walking later—which consisted of him passing by several stripped patches that used to have Berries—he reached one particular patch that was still bursting with Berries, fresh for the picking. “Huh. Guess they missed this one… let’s get to work?” he said in Leon’s direction, gesturing at the patch, which for some reason had been overlooked amidst all the other patches that had been stripped clean.

He could only guess why this patch hadn’t been stripped clean—maybe there was something lurking nearby? Who knows.