Alex seemed hell-bent on assisting. It was touching, though it was really hard to not feel like a burden.

“O-okay,” he said, giving his head a shake to help loosen things up. “Just-- grab a strand and start to work it apart. If you hit a snag, use the thin end of the comb to sort of… pick at it. It hurts less if you squeeze above where you’re pulling.”

It would be a slow, laborious process-- one that, more likely than not, he’d just undo after a couple of days. But his hair could use the reset, and already his curls were starting to pop and bounce, like springs from a t-shirt cannon.

“Oli’s hair is even worse,” he explained, working on another tangle. “She keeps it reaaaaally long and it’s so thick… she used to sit in the chair while my mom brushed it out for hours.”

Alexei Ivanov

“Dunno,” Memo said with a shrug, as they headed out the door, “I imagine you have many acquaintances. You are the longest standing gym leader in the region, right?”

Alex had showed up to his shitty apartments in disguise once, for god’s sake. The man was practically a celebrity.

“Oh, by all means. Show me off. You may not have realized but I happen to be very cute.” There, there was a tiny flicker of the old Memo charm; he winked, looping their arms together. “Like a dog in a purse in a place it should not be.”

Alexei Ivanov
this song has been stuck in my head since this mission came around
party timeskip <3

☉

“We could use Atalys,” Memo offered, delighted to be distracted from the task at hand-- the smell was already making him nauseous, bringing forward vivid flashbacks of kicking and screaming on the kitchen floor as his parents forcibly drove his hands into the cold, smelly innard of a beheaded pumpkin: Ester trying to soothe him, Mira much too old and ladylike for this, Oli threatening to upend the gut bucket over his head as a joke. “She’s not a Wooloo but. It’d be better than Jove, anyway.”

He heaves a sigh and hovers his hands, clad in nitrile gloves. The dust from the inner lining coats his fingertips.

“You were always a ghost?” he asks, half a laugh at the irony of it. “Always? Didn’t you ever want to be something else?”

Alex offered him a bowl. Memo closed his eyes and said a little prayer and reached in.

“It’ll be hollow when-- when we’re done,” he said, scooping a big handful of seeds and orange goop and trying really really hard not to heave. He slung it in the bowl and went back for more. “We gotta get it all empty. Might have to cut a little bit off the sides, I think. I haven’t carved a pumpkin in forever so I can’t quite remember.”

Alexei Ivanov
the guillermo/ceej anti pumpkin carving experience is REAL
tricking or treating

☉

He tilted his head, letting Alex’s little tidbit of knowledge marinate for a bit, like a beam balance seeking equilibrium. All he could really do was try, right?

“God, what would I even say.”

His boyfriend echoed the mental sentiment verbally. Though Memo did wince, a little, at being called defeatist.

“I never used to be.” It’s remorseful, wistful, like remembering the ghost of something once thought fond now gone sour. "Or maybe I used to be better at internalizing it." There’s a taste of panic on his tongue, the panic at losing who he is, not recognizing the person he’s become. It’s in that moment he realizes and remembers why he hates self-reflection: it feels pathetic. It feels cold. Another useless habit, piled atop a pyramid stack of them.

“Do you ever feel like you don’t know who you are anymore?”

He turns Alex's hand over in his own, tracing the lines of his boyfriend's palm with his thumbs.

Alexei Ivanov
autumn's ominous wind

☉

His smile turned a little bit pained at the mention of tea parties. Oh, god, not the tea.

(His mother, hailing from Paldea, had been a coffee person-- something he’d inherited, as had most of his siblings.)

“I told someone once that the scariest thing in Galar was the ghost of old tea,” he said, as Oli shot a Starly out of the sky and down to the beach. “I’m not sure he believed me.” Memo zapped the starling with a Pokeball.

He’d forgotten about cricket. In his defense, he hadn’t been home in a long time.

“Do you go back? Ever?”

---

catch attempt starly. water/flying/dragon

Remiel Calcifet

☉

The tiff with Alexandra Briarwood had left him bruised and sore, with a badly swollen knee; add to that a general, latent exhaustion and lingering discomfort from whatever the fuck had happened with Shivani during her mega-evolution and Memo was slow to pick himself up off the ground. After safely returning his fainted Banette to her Pokeball he rested against a pillar of rock spurred up by Groudon (fucking Groudon, for chrissakes Arceus’s sake) to catch his breath and take stock of the battlefield.

He’s reminded, uncomfortably, of the last time he was in Littleroot, when it was burning down around him and that crazy sonofabitch ass deer trapped them in a cage of black thorns and then Kyle fucking Lopez proceeded to set it on fire. The current scene is no better.

The lull breaks, like a wave. Panic sets in. He has to find Alex.

Thankfully, it’s not long after that he would feel something grab his jacket and tug. He makes a startled, aborted scream, flails a bit, and falls still when he feels hot breath on the back of his head and hears a familiar rumbling.

Ah, yes. There’s a reason, he thinks, Salamence taxis never took off.

Gabe wastes no time in throwing him like a veritable chew toy. One second he was dangling helplessly in the jaws of life and the next he was flying through the air towards another familiar sight. Alex’s arms wrapped around him, and he closed his around Alex in turn, hitting the other man’s chest with a light, “Oof.”

He buried his face in the crook of Alex’s shoulder, content to just stay there and hug him till the end of time, breathing him in with ragged inhales.

“Away,” he said, voice still wrecked, throat sore, “to the hills.” He blinked, lifting his head, realizing he was a bit delirious. “I’m okay. Are you okay?”

Alex’s Gardevoir dropped rings of healing energy around them and the throbbing in his knee ceased. There was an uncomfortable sounding pop as the joint righted itself and he sank his teeth into his lower lip with a painful gasp-- but those wounds, too, soon closed. Despite this, his brain was still miles behind him, and it took Alex’s cool head in the chaos to find Sibella’s Pokeball and offer it to his Gardevoir for assistance.

He leaned into Alex and looked down at Sibella’s prone form as if in a dream. Her wings were folded up to her body, eyes closed, neck craned uncomfortably. Flecks of frost littered her fur.

Memo blinked away tears. This could not happen again. He wrapped an arm around Alex and pulled him close, clinging.

Then everything exploded again.

Alex said something angrily and stood. Memo’s feet came free and he shakily balanced himself on the ground, not wanting to slow Alex down, to make them a target.

Sibella chirped-- awake, alive-- and forced her head under his hand. He went from smiling at her to looking up into the face of fucking Dialga.

“Holy shit.”

He didn’t recognize the person who seemed to be attracting most of Alex’s ire, though he could definitely relate with the stranger’s mentality.

With a sound like shattering glass, the Primal Point begins to fragment; the gentle tinkling crescendos into a scream, and Memo claps one hand to his ear and one ear to Alex’s chest against the noise. Sibella screeches and pins her sensitive ears back.

Hilariously, the blonde villain tries to monologue in the wake of that cacophony. As though anyone could hear him.

Alex’s Gardevoir is replaced by-- by--

”Tornadus?!” Memo gasps, voice much louder than it needs to be as his ears are still ringing. His shocked gaze goes back and forth between the djinni and his boyfriend. Alex was in no mood to be giving explanations, however; his eyes were dark and his voice more savage than Memo had ever heard. A tiny pang goes off in his heart because he feels, once more, like a burden, forcing the people around him to make sacrifices for his sake-- then he shakes his head and stands on his own-- hand trailing down Alex’s arm to grab protectively onto his wrist, so as to not be separated again-- other hand free to recall Sibella and release Freya, who launches herself fearlessly into the fray with a huge grin.

The Lucario locks eyes with Dialga and, without hesitation, charges the time-god with extreme speed, the area around her body glittering and diamond-like, infused with Fairy-type energy from Diamond Storm.

6ftf0_oL

---

Tl;DR
Alexei Ivanov
reuinted and it feels so good (memo's a bit silly in the head right now)
heals noivern.
swaps noivern for lucario
uses extreme speed on dialga empowered by diancie.
soft tags for
kyle lopez Alexandra Briarwood Elisabeth Fiorelli

☉

Memo couldn’t help himself but laugh. Of course Alex wasn’t afraid of Sableye, somehow. Of course. “I can’t believe-- that thing is way creepier than so many other ghosts-- creepier than the teapot, definitely-- and you’re not scared of it?”

He pulled Alex along behind him, letting his boyfriend go on and on about the ins and outs of Sabeleye gender differences. Frollo was jumping between perches, leading them on to where, Memo hoped, they’d soon find Will and the lamb. He continued to mimic the jingling noise of Will’s crown as he went.

“One guess. Probably because he’s a little shit.”

Their luck was not up that night. Frollo’s next perch was a suspiciously sharp object; he’d almost landed when the Doublade reared up, blades glinting in the moonlight. The parrot cawed raucously in fear, flailing backwards to get out of the way of the slash aimed at him. Only Corazon grabbing the pink scarf and giving the thing a vicious shake saved him from having his head bisected from his body.

Memo let go of Alex’s hand to catch the panicking psittacine, cradling him to his chest as he continued to scream. Cora spat the roughed-up Doublade free, the swords clanging to the ground. Memo zapped them with a Pokeball before they could get back up.

Alexei Ivanov
ghost/psychic
catch attempt doublade

☉

Remiel seems to find his confusion at the presence of a Galarian culture festival amusing, which, Memo supposed, was probably the best case scenario given that he sort of kind of insulted the man’s entire position. What was the Galarian Ambassador other than a cultural figurehead? That Memo had just pushed over and stomped into the ground?

Olí fires a hydro pump at a passing Pikipek, knocking the baby bird into the sand. Memo collects it in a Pokeball, frowning, as his Horsea does triumphant jumps in and out of the waves.

“Sure,” Memo allowed, not entirely sold on the prospect of a Galar party, “what kind of events are there?”

Maybe he was being too harsh. As long as there wasn’t a how to ostracize your gay youth booth, maybe it would be all right.

---

catch attempt pikipek. water/flying/dragon

Remiel Calcifet

☉

He watched Alex devolve into a fit of giggles with a wry, but knowing, smile, and a generous roll of his eyes. “Very funny,” he said, fake-insulted as he turned his chin away with a hmph. “I’ll make sure to tell my mom and all my tias that they have an ally in their war against me.”

His sarcasm broke off with a wince as he caught on another small snarl; a few picks later and he was through it. More of his hair was beginning to curl and spring free in an aimless pattern, wild from being locked up for so long.

“Yeah, I know, it’s part of the reason why I never do this.” He huffed at an errant strand that sprung down into his face.

At Alex’s offer to help, he stilled.

“Y-you really want to?” he said, more shocked that his boyfriend was interested in something as mundane as his hair than anything else. “It’s… you know, time consuming and kind of greasy.”

Alexei Ivanov