Blue, Bede, and Silver stood outside the Viridian Gym at nine the next morning, waiting for the driver that was to collect Bede to show up. The few challengers that had already been there were chased away, so it was just the three of them.

"So, I guess this is it," Silver said.

"I never knew three days could last so long," Bede said. "At least it felt that way to me."

In a good way or a bad way? Blue wondered. "Were things decent enough?" he asked cautiously. "After the mess, I mean?"

"You're worried what the League Board might think if I say things did not turn out well?" Bede asked knowingly, and Blue shook his head.

"No, I'm just worried about how Opal would react," he half-lied. "She's a great Leader and all, but she's scary sometimes."

   "I find it funny how out of all of the Leaders, it's Opal who scares you when Drayden and Whitney are in the same room," Silver said.

Blue rolled his eyes at that. "Yeah, yeah, Whitney is terrifying, it's not like I haven't heard that one a thousand times," he said. "Whitney has her demon Miltank, but Opal has over seventy years of experience. That's scarier to me."

Silver nodded respectfully. "Wow, that's actually a logical response," he said, impressed. "Good for you."

A tiny spike of irritation jabbed at Blue, and he sneered. "You want that paycheck or not? 'Cause I can easily take it back," he taunted.

Regardless of whether Silver knew Blue was only kidding (partially), it still seemed to take some of the wind out of his sails. "That's low, even for you. I'm surprised."

"I'm a man of many surprises," Blue said with a mischievous smile. He then noticed that Bede had zoned out of the conversation. His gaze was elsewhere, his hands in his coat pockets as a slight frown was visible on his face. "What's wrong?" Blue asked.

Bede glanced at him, and Blue was surprised to see the slight hint of worry his eyes held. "Could you not tell Ms. Opal or the Board how I acted?" he asked. "I didn't mean it... for the most part. I don't want to return to a punishment, because I know Ms. Opal will think of something worse than cleaning the entire stadium."

"I'm obligated to tell 'em how everything went and what happened," Blue said, and Bede struggled to hide a wince. "But I'll be vague with the details," Blue quickly followed up with. "I'll just say we didn't get along at first because of a clash in battle or Gym management thoughts."

The tenseness left Bede's shoulders as they slumped with relief. "Thank you. And..." He exhaled sharply. "I'm sorry, Mr. Blue."

Blue's eyes widened, both because of the apology and what Bede had called him. "Mr. Blue? Didn't expect to hear that," he said. He was sure he'd been more surprised over these past three days than in his entire life.

Bede frowned. "It is merely a formality, one that I chose to neglect for my own reasons. Now, I'm trying to apologize here!" he huffed, like what he was saying was incredibly difficult to get out. And for him, it was. "Again, I am sorry." He hung his head. "You apologized to me yesterday, and I hadn't. I don't want to leave without apologizing myself."

So the kid actually had a conscience? "Because you feel bad that you didn't?" He somewhat hoped that was the case here.

"Because I told myself I would not apologize unless you did," Bede said, looking back up. And there went what Blue was thinking. Maybe he shouldn't have expected that much from Bede, even with the leaps and bounds that had occurred in the last day. "But I also do feel a tad guilty for what I said. In addition to that, you were actively trying to make me feel better. That made me reconsider some things last-minute," Bede then said somewhat sheepishly, tugging up his coat collar.

Never mind. Blue was genuinely happy that Bede had apologized. It made him get one of those stereotypical warm, fuzzy feelings. "Apology accepted," he said.

"You're not as bad as I thought you were, though I still believe you have too much of an ego," Bede said with narrowed eyes.

Nope, Blue wasn't going to be bothered by a jab like that. He was in a good mood right now, and it was only getting better. "Not egotistical, confident," he corrected. "And if you think I'm egotistical, then maybe try lookin' in a mirror," he said half-jokingly.

Bede put a hand to his chest, stating, "It's difficult to disprove it when I clearly do have the skills to back up my words."

"And so do I," Blue retorted.

"Yeah, yeah, we all know you're both amazing, so you can tone it down now," Silver sighed.

Blue grinned, cheerfully clapping a hand down on Silver's shoulder. Silver instantly stiffened but didn't bother trying to escape. He knew well enough by now that there was no escaping Blue when he was in an upbeat mood. "Oh, lighten up! And I thought ya wanted us to get along," Blue said.

"What gave you that impression?" Silver asked flatly.

"I dunno. Intuition, I guess," Blue said.

"To that, I suppose you could say we're getting along," Bede said, shrugging.

"See, he admits it!" He was probably going to get kicked for this, but he didn't care. Blue put his other arm around Bede's shoulders, and the blonde protested and tried to squirm away, which prompted Blue to laugh and pull the two of them closer. "You both need to lighten up, honestly. And no, snark and snappy comebacks don't count!"

"I don't exactly know how to do anything else," Silver said while Bede muttered, "I pride myself on those, however..." If only things could've been like this sooner. At least they were now.

Bede's escort to Saffron City arrived not long afterwards, and it was finally time for the trio to disband. Bede seemed to be having a difficult time lifting his own luggage into the car, so Blue helped him out, only to stagger under the weight himself. He was successfully able to play it off though, ignoring Silver's suspicious stare.

"Thank you again, Mr. Blue," Bede said. "And thank you as well, Mr. Silver. I definitely won't forget these last three days."

"You'd better not, because I'll just bring them up at the next Gym Leader conference," Blue said. "I'd better see you there, by the way. I wanna see how much stronger you've gotten in another rematch."

Bede's eyebrows rose before he gave Blue a cocky grin. "I couldn't possibly turn that down. Be sure to prepare yourself, because I'll show you proper pink, a truly great pink," he stated with a truth that only he believed. He seemingly didn't know how to give a proper goodbye afterwards, so he said somewhat awkwardly, "Well, I suppose this is goodbye." He gave the older Trainers a quick wave before shutting himself in the car's backseat.

"See ya later," Blue said while Silver waved back, and the car pulled away. Blue watched it vanish into downtown Viridian before stating, "I still don't know what that means! Seriously, what does 'a truly great pink' even mean? He says it like we should know it." He glanced at Silver, hoping for some kind of answer.

"Beats me. It seems only he and Opal will ever know," Silver said. "So it looks like your positivity won out in the end. You feel proud of yourself?"

"Hell yeah." Blue proved his point with an overdramatic fist-pump. "But again, it was thanks to you that things worked out. Expect a generous paycheck!"

Silver smiled cooly, shrugging. "Eh, the money's great, but I actually enjoyed it as well," he admitted. "Maybe I'll tag along to the next Gym Leader conference with you so I can say hello to him again."

"Sounds good to me," Blue said. "The League Board is gonna be shaken up some thanks to him."

"That sounds like it will either be exciting or terrifying," Silver said.

Blue grinned. "Guess we'll have to find out." He pulled out his Pokégear and opened his message logs. He needed to tell Red about the madness he'd just survived, and how he couldn't wait to see the pastel terror at the next Gym Leader conference. It definitely was going to be interesting.