“Well,” Rebecca said as she watched the Dratini leave. “It’s nice to know that diplomacy is still an option. Nice work, Nina.” Rebecca rolled the information over in her head as she went along. If it didn’t really care about whether it won or lost, it probably had a lot of reserves, and she didn’t consider it to be too big of a stretch to say that it can influence just about any wild pokemon in any “mystery dungeon” and that it just might be what’s causing them to appear in the first place. She made sure to write that down, just about finishing her notes when Dexter asked for clarification on the issue of their pay.

“Wait,” Rebecca said, stopping after she regained her composure, “Did you guys get an advance payment in your old team? Because Nina took that job for us, and it was super nebulous and dangerous, and we almost died, and we did not see any money before we started. I guess we could make a case that we’ve found out what’s causing the Mystery Dungeons now, though, or at least found some pretty telling signs, so I think if we ever found that guy again, I could totally negotiate our way to a proper amount of money.”

[Spruce]

Things started getting worse before they got better. Before Kamina used water gun on me, I actually started to hallucinate, seeing this as that, and seeing Kamina as some giant yellow bird... heck, Celes looked like one of those 'human' things you'd occasionally see on the walls of ancient pokemon temples, and in photographs older than time, itself. Kamina's water gun did the trick, and everything looked normal again, and I seemed much better overall. "Thanks again, Kamina, you're a real lifesaver, you know that?" my speech even sounded normal at that point. I then remembered something about apples, and checked my bag. "Hey, who wants apples? I got some, and I figured we're all pretty hungry, so... anyone who wants one, just talk to the snake riding the eel," I then held out four of them using two vine whips, and my leafy hands. It seemed like we had some time before the next fight with some random fire type that Miles won't want to be within twenty feet of, so it seemed like the perfect time to eat, and rest... however much we CAN rest in a place like this. While I waited for teammates to line up, I decided to take a look at the outer wall... the windows were giant, and worse, it seemed like there wasn't even so much as a guard rail or even glass to keep someone in if they happen to go out that far. I had a feeling that a lot of ground-bound fire types fell to either their death or serious injury because of that detail. That might be something to talk to Reshiram about if he doesn't try to kill us about thirty seconds after seeing us, that is.

---

[Anthony]

Thankfully, the water gun did the trick, and Spruce seemed much happier and healthier just from that. Josh probably still wanted to keep an eye on him, and from what I've seen before this, I couldn't blame him. "I wonder if fire type attacks have the same effect on Spruce..." I thought out loud before continuing on. I then realized that the rest of the party was still back behind me, apparently just about ready to eat up. I would have asked for an apple, but I decided against it just because I already had an apple. Daniel landed near me... for a brief moment before shouting and getting back in the air. "ACK! Stupid floor. Anyways, Anthony, um... good luck trying to make friends with Spruce, and it's good to see that you're at least a little worried about him... means you'd rather have him around than do this on your own," Daniel tried his best to smile, and I could tell he was trying, just as I could tell that it was very difficult for a bird to smile. He then looked somewhat tired, and just as well, he hasn't had a place to rest his wings during this dungeon. "Hey, Daniel, maybe you could rest on my 'shell'. I'm sure that it's at least better than trying to rest on the metal floor," He then nodded, and did just that. Huh, now we have two pokemon acting as safe zones for teammates... first Kamina, and now me. I thought as I headed back to where Spruce was handing out apples just to make sure we don't starve on our way to Reshiram.

---

[Bonnie]

Tini's relentless assault of fairy wind, and shouting his moves was enough to make the dragonite try to go for me, again. She glared at me, and used dragon rush on me, completely ignoring Tini's words. I was paralyzed, and I thought I wouldn't be able to do anything, let alone attack, however... somehow, just before she could get to me with her move, I managed to hit her, and knock her back with my frustration move. I would have tried to walk, or even jump away from her, but my paralysis started acting up, forcing me to stay still. "Eralion... someone... finish her off... please..." I managed to say, though, my sentence was broken up by more bouts of paralysis. The dragonite, ignoring me again, flew over to Eralion, and tried to use fire punch on him, apparently figuring out that he was a steel type... or maybe it was just a lucky guess. Either way, if he got hit, it would probably hurt, and she'd know to use that move against him, rather than dragon rush. This is bad... why can't we just finish her off? It seems like every time she should have fainted, she just continues on... no, there's got to be a way to end this. I think as I see a group of dratini slither past Tini. They looked oddly familiar, as in, they looked like the ones we knocked out earlier, however... they didn't attack us for some reason. Maybe they just knew we'd knock them out in one attack again. They seemed to be trying to say something to their mother, but due to the general noise of the fight, nobody could hear them, not even me.

---

[Nina]

While it seemed like Rebecca was answering it, I ended up kind of trying to answer as well. "You see, it's kind of a weird... underground group of pokemon who have been... erm, trying to figure out what makes mystery dungeons tick, and... well, for some reason, they picked us... maybe the guy who picked our group wasn't very experienced with this type of work, 'cause he flaked on our payment for any notes that might help with... um... them figuring out how mystery dungeons worked?" I wasn't actually sure about this whole thing, or even if I could trust that company, whoever they were. Heck, if we didn't get paid when we got back to Allure, this time, then I'd just give the information to the nearest guildmaster... or even just do this for free, without any ties to some underground group. I then continued onward, wondering if we'd fight any pokemon this time... nah, of course we will. My thoughts were interrupted by a gible, and a swablu who both looked a little mad at the world. I attacked the swablu with a poison sting, just to try to poison the thing, and I looked back to see that Rebecca wasn't really enjoying going up this mountain... in fact, if I didn't know any better, I'd say that she and Dexter decided to wait... whoops. Luckily, I wasn't too far ahead of them, but I did take a sand tomb while I was looking back at them, the move was thankfully weak, but it still hurt me thanks to my bad typing against the move. The swablu then used fury attack against me, and while it hit me a few times, and did some damage... the thing also accidentally hit one of my poisonous spikes, and it ended up poisoned as a result.

Celes walked forwards and then sighed a bit. Well... at least the group could take a moment to rest, but the heat did get to her a bit. No matter. She was actually used to it by now. She preferred the warmth then the cold, probably also cause she was used to her flareon brother and his dang pranks... She was used to heat cause of him and his dang house fires he kept doing.... no matter, she kept on moving and stayed near the group.
"I am ok. I guess I am just used to not eat too much." she then says softly to the group after Spruce asked if anyone was hungry. She just stayed near, looking at the window. No protection or anything. One accident and oups.... a flattened pokemon.... She gulp a bit. Better be careful here.

---

Deravan saw the fire punch coming.... but just grin a bit as he took the attack right on the chest.... not before having used counter right before.
"Bad choice...." he says to the dragonite before then letting a full force counter attack back at her, only to feel the fire effect from the punch. He groan a bit at this. Well, it did hurt, but he was still holding on right now. He looked at the dragonite, and then stick his tongue out a bit.
"That all you can do? I fought magikarps that were tougher then you!" he then says to the dragonite. Well... poor magikarps there. He was not saying all of them were weak. Just that lot of them needed to evolve to actually be able to do much. He then saw the dratinis... and how they were trying to talk to the dragonite. Eralion simply used counter again in case.

[Josh]
Spruce seemed to be doing better after Kamina's attempt to cool him down, or at least better than he was before. He offered the apples that he grabbed before to whoever needed them. It had been a while since the last time he'd eaten, so he decided to take one. "Thanks, Spruce." He said. He tried to eat it quickly, since wild Pokemon would probably attack any minute now. Then again, they didn't seem to be getting into a lot of fights.

---

[Dexter]
Nina was apparently naive enough to believe that their client forgot to pay them because he was inexperienced with this kind of thing. Dexter, on the other hand, could clearly see what was really happening. "You probably don't realize this, but you're getting ripped off." He said. "I'm 90% sure they didn't just forget to pay you. These shady underground groups pull this kind of shit all the time."

Just as Dexter finished talking, a Gible and a Swablu appeared and attacked Nina. "Alright, we'll deal with this once we get back." He said. Since the Gible posed more of a threat to him, he decided to go for it first. Knowing it would probably resist Ember, he charged forward and bit down as hard as he could. He could tell that the attack hurt it, but not nearly enough to knock it out.

Kamina

It was rather odd, despite being a Water Type far longer than either Flying or Fire, Kamina rarely took advantage of his Water Typing. Had he been the philosophical type, he might have spent a few hours analyzing his past to determine just why that was, and what it said about him as a person. However, he wasn't the philosophical type, so he just settled for taking note how odd it was, and then quickly dismissing it from his mind. "No problem Spruce. Although you really should have came to me sooner, before it got that bad. There's no point in suffering like that when you have someone who can fix it with little effort. Just try to remember that in the future." Once Spruce started handing out apples, Kamina decided he should wait "let me know when everyone's had their fill, and I'll have whatever's left" Kamina had enough fuel in his tank to function until the end of this adventure (or so he estimated), so he wasn't too worried about getting a bite to eat. He was so used to hunger, that it had become more of a minor annoyance then any sort of torment. Grated, he was more used to having a Magikarp metabolism.

---
Tini

To Tini's surprise, the three trouble makers from before had shown up. As they made their way up to the older Dragon Type, Tini realized that he was indeed right about them being her missing children. 'Well, that takes care of that problem' Tini thought to himself, as he eased himself out of combat mode...except it wasn't. The fighting was still going on, and it seemed too loud to hear the young Dratini kid 'clearly, this requires my own special brand of problem solvingness. Wait...is problemsolvingness even a word? Or, maybe it's two words? Huh...this requires further thought. Gah! It's no use, it's too loud in here for me to think! What's causing all of this noise anyway? Oh...right!' Having managed to navigate the labyrinth that was his own mind, Tini was now ready for his next move; first taking a deep breath, Tini then cried out "EVERYONE, BE QUIET!!!!1!!!" Once he had silenced the entire room (and replenished his air supply) he started talking again "that's better. Now ma'am, I believe that those three are your missing children" he pointed at the three Dratini "as you can see, their all safe and sound. Hopefuly, this will teach you all a valuable lesson about not attacking random strangers."

“Well Nina,” Rebecca said, trying to fix her hair back up before continuing, “This looks like one of those big “main quest” jobs, which would be pretty big, to say the least. Now, I love the magic of friendship as much as the next adventurer, but if you ask me, we’d be much better off going into a fight with money. Money spent on TMs and fancy consumable items to use right when it starts to look like we’re really in a bind. So whether or not these pokemon are conning us, they had to have some sort of reason for sending us into that death trap, and if it wasn’t an assassination plan, then we can easily strongarm them into giving us whatever we need. We are the ones with the information, after all.” Though the Ralts lagged behind Nina a bit, she was thankfully close enough to aid her friend against the next wave of enemies.

“And while we’re talking about strategy,” Rebecca said, managing to use Disarming Voice on the Swablu and Gible despite the fact that she was starting to feel short of breath, “Can we not rush ahead alone like this so much? I mean, these two would actually be pretty threatening if I wasn’t here. Fairies are just kinda... fabulous that way... You know...?” She stopped to take a few more breaths, starting to feel lightheaded. She was starting to feel like she maybe should have invested in an air tank of some kind. Or maybe just figured out how to use her psychic powers to gather in more air or something, but who has that kind of talent and foresight?

Whilst watching our party eat up a few apples, I heard Spruce muttering and beginning to mumble. I turned around to see Spruce, who certainly looked dizzy and his skin seemed to wilt somewhat. I jumped in the air when he got smacked by a stream of water, noticing Kamina managing to do that despite his... you know what, a lot of things shouldn't exist. Let's not question that. Besides, Spruce thanked the Gyrados and the pair exchanged words. Celes seemed oddly comfortable in the heat, while I felt parched right after eating that cooked berry. I probably wouldn't eat another one of those, honestly.

Before I could ask whether we could move on or not, Spruce dropped the fact there were large gaps in the walls. The whole place looked more like someone blasted sections of the wall rather than an outdoor area of the building. Looked like there was a scuffle; but if there was a scuffle, the edges of the gaps would be straighter and less cleanly cut. Architectural designs like this were also dangerous for this large building, made literally out of welded junk and inhabited by questionably hot Pokemon. Everyone seemed worried and they were completely right in that regard - they weren't the ones floating. I just glanced at it and thought it was dangerous for the building itself, really.

[Spruce]

We finally finished eating, and we finally started moving again, and, thankfully, we were moving AWAY from the obvious trap. It didn't take too long, however, before we encountered a charizard, and a salamence... two large, intimidating dragons, and both of them looked like they wanted us out of this place, one way or another. I tried to think of any way for me to be even remotely useful in this fight, however... I couldn't come up with any ideas. Miles had his electricity, Celes was a fairy type, Anthony was somehow not weak to dragon type moves, and could use counter, Josh had his water, even if it was weakened in the heat of this place, even Daniel had his job as a user of shadow moves... I, however... had nothing I could really do, except... perhaps... I waited for the charizard to get close enough to Kamina, and once he did, as a part of a flare blitz move, I flung a group leech seeds on the charizard's face. Sure, he didn't notice it yet, but he will, soon enough. I also ducked just to make sure that he couldn't really aim for me with his fire-type moves, and I ended up thinking out loud... "If only Kamina could make it rain in here with his water... that would really help out," at this point, my attention turned towards Anthony, who somehow survived a dragon claw from the salamence, and, better yet, countered the move, punching the salamence in the face with twice the force of the attack that hit Anthony. Ugh... I feel so useless... the only move I have that can really be used here is leech seed, and that's basically nothing compared to Anthony's countering abilities. I thought as the battle raged on.

---

[Anthony]

After a quick meal, everyone finally started to move again, and, as we already decided, we were moving away from the food storage area/trap. It didn't take too long before we bumped into a couple more pokemon in this area, this time, they were a charizard and a salamence, meaning that, as usual, Spruce was going to have some serious trouble. Just as well, he wasn't attacking either of the enemies, that is, until he saw it fit to throw a bunch of weird seeds at the charizard, who didn't even so much as flinch at the things. I was looking at him for too long, and took a dragon claw to my 'shell', which hurt, but not nearly as much as I felt it should have. I then used counter to, well, counter the attack that was thrown at me, doubling the power in the process. Spruce, obviously distressed, then murmured something to Kamina, or, to himself, it was hard to tell. I then used dragon breath on the salamence, hoping to paralyze it, however, that didn't work, and the salamence flew up into the air, or, rather, flew about forty feet up into the air, for some odd reason. It's not like the thing can really fly too high in a tower. The charizard tried to use flare blitz, aiming for Spruce, however, since Spruce was on Kamina's head, the move would probably hit Kamina, instead. After that, Daniel flew off of my 'shell', and up to where the salamence was, using shadow rush on the thing, and knocking it back a few feet. It growled, but Daniel just laughed, as if he knew that he could take the thing on... somehow.

---

[Nina]

"Right... there's always that possibility," I answered, somewhat glumly, to Dexter. While I wanted to believe these pokemon were on the up-and-up, the proof just kept piling up that they... well, weren't. Dexter bit the gible after his speech, and Rebecca rejoined us and told me about how I shouldn't just rush off into danger head-first like I have been. She did that while using disarming voice on the enemies, leaving the gible just barely conscious. "Y...yeah... that was pretty dumb of me... sorry, Rebecca," I said before using double kick on the gible, finishing it off before it could really do anything. The swablu then surprised me, at least, by using dragon rush on me, apparently angered by its poison. "H...how did...!?" I manage to ask in stunned confusion as the bird looked at me with what I could only assume was a smug smile from its feat. "Dr...dragon... rush!? HOW!?" I ended up saying, still wondering how it knew that move, let alone used it. My mind was reeling from the power of the attack, as well as the fact that I didn't think it could learn that move. The thing coughed, a bit from the poison, and then used roost to heal itself back up to peak condition... this was going to be one of THOSE battles, now, wasn't it? If I wasn't so busy wondering how that swablu used that move, then I probably would have taken advantage of its use of roost, and used double kick, however, I think I might have actually flinched, unfortunately.

---

[Bonnie]

It seemed like Eralion's counter finally did the trick, and knocked out the mother dragonite. Her children seemed upset until she woke back up, confused and dazed. "Where... am I?" she asked the group. "You're on Mt. Dragoncoil... y...you were attacking us, a few moments ago," I answered, confused at her asking questions rather than attacking. "Me? Attack someone? Never," I then tried to explain with "Yeah, you were. You even paralyzed me, and, I'm sure if Eralion didn't stop you, you would have attacked your own kids," she gasped at that, and then noticed her children among the group. She flew over to them and one of them said something... weird... "We can go now, Mom... that thing... it's not controlling us. We have to be quick, though," I... had no idea what any of that meant, but I was more than happy to see the family fly towards Scale City, and away from us. Why couldn't my family have been like that? I thought as I saw them leave, unfortunately, that thought also reminded me of my father, and I tried to make myself forget about that by simply moving upwards and forwards. "Let's get this mission done quick, alright? I'm starting to have... um... flashbacks," I said to the group as I tried to move through the paralysis. Of course, that didn't work until it finally wore off, and THEN I finally started moving towards our other client again. I could hear some sounds from lower on the mountain, for some odd reason, as I walked... it almost sounded like there was some sort of fight down there. Strange.

After more lingering in the same area (which was dangerous considering other Pokemon likely knew where we were), we started to trod on and progress in the dungeon once more. We passed by peculiar engravings into the mass-welded walls, mostly incomprehensible ramblings or signs stamped together. One object in particular stood out, being a cassette player smashed into two and stuck on opposite ends. That thing was even older than the last generation of humans. I carried on moving with the others and visually inspecting every corner, once I noticed I was being left behind.

Only about 10 seconds in, we were confronted a Charizard and Salamence pair. One of them I could probably toast, the other resist... other than that, they were pretty intimidating for our current line-up. "Well, I should hang back for this." I could tank the Salamence if he tried to use Dragon-type actions, but that Charizard could easily fry and melt me within seconds (and I didn't want to be a dead weight again). Of course, as long as I didn't get in the way of things, I could try to electrocute the Charizard.

...I spent too long thinking about the best possible strategy, witnessing Anthony sucker the living daylights of the Salamence. Spruce seemed remarkably reserved, but I didn't think too much of it as I struck lightning from my magnets at the Charizard, keeping an eye out for anything else that may suddenly strike.

Celes fallowed the group, but soon after, the group was attacked by 2 intimidating dragons.... well... 1 that wasen't really a dragon. She never could figure out why Charizard wasen't a dragon type. Anyway, she moved quickly forwards.
"I got the salamance guys." she then says before using moonblast on the thing, full force. If the group could knock that thing out right here and now... The charizard on the other hand would be an issue for her. Hidden power didn't work well, moonblast either.... but her light chains could work here, and shadow ball could be useful, but she didn't have any super effective moves. No mather. It was best to take care of that salamance first before moving on to that charizard. She tried her best to get in front of the salamance's dragon types moves, knowing she was immune to them.

---

Eralion looked calmly as the dragonite was knocked out from his counter... but he then fell down, only to have a hand on the ground right now as he breath in deeply, taking back some energy.
"Ya... you were attacking us..." he said to the dragonite, before she left with her children's. He looked at Bonnie and breath in deeply.
"I am glad everyone is ok now... Lets go and do this job..." he says as he gets up slowly, although it felt weird to have this new form now. He looked at Bonnie, and smiles softly.
"This gonna need to take some getting used to..." he says smiling at her.

Kamina

The sight of the Charazard and Salamance approaching them for a fight almost got Kamina excited enough to just jump at them...until he remembered his passenger 'oh...right' that little tidbit changed his entire strategy 'I guess I'll just have to let the others take care of this. Keeping Spruce from getting incinerated is my number one priority.' Before he could think any further about that, the Charazard set itself on fire and charged him, clearly aiming for Spruce 'not while I'm alive!' Kamina adjusted his body so that his tail was in front, and then he held it up to intercept the charging Fire Type right before he hit them. The impact pushed Kamina back a little, but he kept his ground "not so fast there, I'm not letting you get my little buddy up here. You're going to have to go through me first." Then, to emphasize his point, he spat water at the Charazard's face.

---
Tini

"Yay! They stopped doing violence!" Tini wasn't entire sure what had just happened, but he did know that the results pleased him greatly. For him, that was all he really needed to know. Suddenly, he remembered something momentous that had just occurred "Yay! Eralion evolved!" Tini bounced onto the Dark and Fighting type, coiling himself around his body "celebration hugs! You're not really tiny anymore! But you're still really fuzzy, so double yay!" For Tini, all was right with the world. Granted, he didn't really have high standers or anything, but it was still worth noting "Bonnie, Bonnie get over here! How can we have celebration hugs if you're not doing it too?" Bonnie's absence from the group hug was a serious problem that needed to be rectified as soon as possible.

[Josh]
The group's progress was put to a halt when they were attacked a Charizard and a Salamence. Josh had an advantage over the Charizard, even if his water was weakened, and Celes could easily handle the Salamence. As long as they could keep their more vulnerable teammates safe from any attacks, these dragons shouldn't be too much of a problem. Josh used Thunderbolt on the Charizard, since it wasn't weakened by the heat, and would probably be a lot more effective than Hydro Pump would.

---

[Dexter]
Now that the Gible was down, Dexter shifted over to the Swablu. It was poisoned, but it just roosted away the damage.
"Oh, you gotta be shitting me." Dexter groaned. This battle was about to be real tedious if it just healed anything they managed to do to it. He began spewing embers at it, hoping that with all three of them attacking it, it would go down quickly.

“Oh, great,” Rebecca mumbled to the Swablu. “So you’re just going to try and stonewall all of us by yourself?” She took a deep breath, both as a means of expressing her exasperation and of simply catching her breath. She wondered why in the world it (or whatever was controlling it) would try and waste all of their time with this. Did it have friends on the way? Was it serving as a diversion for something else? Or did it just get a kick out of the trouble it was causing? She wasn’t even sure if the Swablu or anything related to knew the tactical value of what it was doing one way or the other, and decided to just use Confusion in the meantime, picking up the recently grounded bird with her mind and throwing it back into the ground.

[Spruce]

Kamina took the charizard's attack with ease, and even spat another water gun at his face. With nothing better to do, I decided to use coil, as he did that, and again as Miles, and Josh shocked the thing, causing him to stumble backwards. The charizard then grumbled, and swapped places with the salamence, apparently having had enough of this. The charizard then ran up to Celes, apparently mad, and used flare blitz, probably as revenge for what she did to his friend. The salamence then charged at Kamina with a dragon rush, but, as it did so, I used leech seed on him, as well. I then used coil again just as a way of waiting for something to do... though, the move did seem to increase a few key stats... I wonder if I could use this one, maybe two more times... and then Kamina could use water gun on the ground so I'd have a safe place to stand... but, if that all works... then I could actually start attacking these things. I thought as the battle raged on. I then ended up saying "Kamina, the next chance you get, you should use water gun on the ground, I've got a stupid idea!" that seemed to distract Anthony, who missed a chance to use counter because of that. Immediately after Anthony shouted "What!?", the salamence tried to use ice fang on Kamina, probably aware of the fact that he wasn't a normal gyrados, and probably wondering if he was a dragon type, or something else that was weak to ice. I already knew it wasn't going to work very well, and decided to pass the time with another coil.

---

[Anthony]

After my counter, Celes' moonblast, and Daniel's shadow rush, the salamence seemed somewhat annoyed, and decided to switch places with their charizard friend, and the charizard greeted us with a 'friendly' flare blitz, aiming right for Celes. I tried to get in the way, but I wasn't exactly fast enough for that, and she probably took some serious damage. Daniel then decided to use shadow rush on the charizard, not really caring who his current target was. The charizard almost bit Daniel, as if he was attempting to eat the bird, but Daniel moved out of the way. The charizard then tried to attack Celes again, this time with fire fang, and I seemed ready, I was already in front of her to take the attack, and, I did, however, Spruce made me miss an opportunity to use counter when he randomly shouted "Kamina, the next chance you get, you should use water gun on the ground, I've got a stupid idea!"... I couldn't respond to that any other way but by shouting "What!?" I was just confused at the whole idea of him wasting a turn that could easily be used to attack the charizard or salamence with attacking the ground, of all things... Why the heck would anyone do that!? What in the world is Spruce's plan that would need Kamina to attack the ground? I thought as I simply stood there, in between Celes and the charizard, ready for the charizard's next attack, and hoping that I can actually counter it. Unfortunately, at least for me, the next attack was a flamethrower, which, while I could take it, even in the sun, I couldn't counter that to save my life, as it wasn't a physical attack.

---

[Bonnie]

Eralion, now evolved, was feeling much happier, and Tini seemed twice as happy as Eralion was about his evolution... Tini then decided to hug him, and asked if I could join as the Dragonite and her kids flew away. I hesitated for a moment before finally letting him hug me for a while. "Well, normally I'd ask you to hurry up, but I could use a short break... besides, you all seem to be having a moment. I don't want to break that up," our client randomly said to us as she took a seat on a nearby rock, and waited for all of this to end. "Don't worry, I won't let it last too long... besides, Tini's got to remember he's on a mission at some point, right?" I responded, all the while trying to give Tini subtle hints that we really should get going again if we're ever going to finish the mission... however, I already knew these hints would be lost on him. Anything that isn't blatantly obvious is pretty much always lost on Tini... but, he always seems to do the right thing anyways... after all, he let me stay on the team, even after I used one of those 'forbidden' moves, and even though I plan on using it whenever it might help our team. I hope his patience doesn't wear thin... I'm not sure if I could even find another team if he kicks me out... then again, I'm probably the leader, now... and I know Eralion won't let him do that... but, I also hope he doesn't leave the team. He's always such a ray of sunshine, and, not to mention, he knows how to fight well. I thought as the hug continued, and our client continued waiting for the hug to end while sitting on her rock.

---

[Nina]

I would have attacked right now, I COULD have attacked right now, but I decided to wait until the swablu used roost, once more, grounding itself and healing most of the pain it took from my teammates. Before it could get airborne, again, I ran at it, and used double kick, seriously damaging the thing. Of course, once it got airborne again, the poison took effect, and it was in serious danger. It seemed to be worried... I had to wonder if that was the actual swablu, or the thing controlling it... then again, the thing controlling it probably didn't care for its life, so, somehow, the swablu was aware of the damage it was taking, and of the poison that it kind of brought upon itself by attacking someone who's covered in poisonous spikes. Either way, it was already almost fainted, and another couple of attacks from my allies would probably be enough to finish the thing off. Thankfully, it didn't really have the chance to use roost until after they all got their turn to attack. The battle was already almost won thanks to that. "Stonewall? Meh, this is more like a wall of leaves. This thing's already almost done for," I commented on Rebecca's comment. Dexter seemed annoyed as well, and he had every right to be, considering what that thing was trying to do before I got to it with a double kick attack.

Kamina

Despite how he acts, Kamina wasn't a complete idiot. Sure he tended to act way before he thought, but that was more because of personal preference then any lack of cognitive ability. So when Spruce told him to douse the ground in water, it didn't take long for him to figure out why 'oh right; the ground is probably too hot for a Grass Type like Spruce' It was very easy for him to forget about how much heat could bother others, due to his double resistance to Fire. He had only known the cold of the ocean before becoming a Fire Type, so his heat tolerance was the norm to him. "Got it!" Kamina quickly got to work spraying the ground with water, making sure that he focused on the ground between them and the hostile locals. 'Eh, I don't think I should play this as aggressively as I normally like to. I might make the floor dry out faster' While he didn't like taking such a passive role in combat, he did care more about his friends then fighting.

---
Tini

Oh, right; the mission. "...Woops..." In his excitement, Tini had completely forgotten why they were even there in the first place "silly me" he ended the hug with a sheepish grin on his face 'even so...the hugs will not be forever halted by this. Oh no, they shall return, and far more powerful then ever before.' With the hug over, and Tini back on the ground, he quieted up as he waited for someone to start walking somewhere, as he had no idea where they were going. In fact, he was starting to get a little fuzzy on the details of the mission, which in his mind were now just 'reunite lovers.' Although to be fair, that was the biggest detail. So it was more likely that his mind had merely simplified it to save thinking space...or not. Honestly, it's hard to tell with this guy sometimes. I mean, have you seen his dreams...you have!? What is wrong with you!? Why would you willing subject yourself to that? You're practically asking to have your mind succumb to madness!

Lightning crackled from my magnets and coursed through the Charizard, with another attack by Josh causing it to stagger and aim for Celes instead. The Salamence went out of its way to start attacking Kamina shortly after occupying the Charizard's spot, whilst the Charizard- hang on, I already described that. Seems as if a lack of blood is starting to get to me. Strange how I have blood as some... whatever I am, not really a Magnemite as much as I was in the past.

Anyway, more moves later, I was tempted to start tanking a few hits. However we still had a Charizard on the field, and I was pretty certain that the Salamence knew more than just Dragon-type moves. Either way, I just continue zapping the Charizard, though I ended up missing and striking the metal pillar behind him. Thankfully only sparks were made as I quickly flicked my magnet away and decided on other moves to undertake.

Celes... didn't see the attack coming... and was thrown back hard, making her actually fly a couple of feet.... too close to a windowless ledge. She quickly used her ribbons to stop her from falling, before throwing herself back onto the ground, visibly shaken by the attack. She looked forwards as she moved to get away from the certain doom she almost had. She looked at the charizard.... and seemed.... really angry now. She quickly moved and used her light chain, and then grabbed the wings of the dragon that wasen't a dragon... anyway.... she then threw him right onto the floor, full force, damaging him from that attack. She then turned and threw him backwards, a bit more away from the group. She was shaking right now.
"I... I almost freaken died there!" she said, shaking when she said that. She looked at the charizard and salamance, staying back right now.

---

Eralion was surprised by the hug that Tini gave him with Bonnie. He just looked at him... but deep down... he felt a certain.... shiver inside of him? What the heck... why did he even shiver there. Then one thing came to mind. Pangoro were both fighting and dark type.... meaning that if a fairy type were to attack him... well... let's just say he would get much more hurt then before. He calmed down afterwards and hugged Tini back, before Bonnie told them that Tini had to remember the mission, and Tini had let go of the hug. Eralion breath deeply as he moved forwards.
"Well... I am just glad I am evolved now, although I think I am gonna need to be a bit more careful with a certain... type of pokemon now." he then said, looking at Tini. He just kept moving forwards. At least he was with them, but if the team ever end up fighting a group of fairy type... Let's say that Eralion would need to do the most damage with his steel type moves.

[Josh]
Spruce seemed to have an idea, and a stupid one at that. From what Josh could tell, it involved him having Kamina cool down the ground so he could stand on it. This would leave him open to an attack from the Charizard or Salamence, which most likely wouldn't end well.
"Spruce, I don't know what exactly you're planning, but it's probably best if you stayed on Kamina's head." Josh said. "I think we can handle them without you putting yourself in danger like this."
Josh used Thunderbolt on the Charizard once again. Considering how many attacks it's been taking, it should be going down soon.

---

[Dexter]
Before the Swablu flew back up into the air, Nina managed to Double Kick it, which did a fair amount of damage. Hoping to knock it out as soon as possible, Dexter used Ember on it, which seemed to do some damage, but not quite enough to knock it out.
"Come on. Let's knock it out before it roosts again." Dexter said. He hoped that Rebecca's attack would be enough to finish it off.

[Spruce]

Kamina complied with my request, and after one more use of coil, I felt more than ready to finally attack. I waited for just a moment for the charizard to accidentally get close enough to Kamina and I, and once he did, I jumped off of Kamina's head, knocked the charizard out with a single void whip, and landed in the puddle of water that was quickly evaporating due to the heat in the area. The salamence, surprised, but still mad that his friend was just knocked out, used ice fang on me, and despite my typing, the move didn't actually do that much. "Kamina, mind trying to pull that off again? The floor's drying off already," I asked to Kamina as the salamence took a few steps back, wondering how the heck I managed to survive its attack. Anthony seemed even more confused with what just happened, and all he could really manage to say was "HOW DID THAT WORK!?" as if he expected my plan to somehow fail. I looked over towards Celes just to make sure she was okay, and she seemed fine, if a little angry over nearly falling to her death. I would have ran towards her to try to comfort her, but... I only had a limited space I could move in... not to mention the fact that we were still in the middle of a battle. I would have attacked the salamence at this point, but I needed to make absolute sure that Kamina was going to replace the water on the floor before I tried anything like what I did earlier. Luckily, apparently seeing me as a lost cause, the salamence tried to use dragon claw on Kamina while I waited for one of two things... either Kamina to use water gun on the floor again, or for the salamence to get close enough for me to attack him.

---

[Anthony]

Celes flew into some sort of rage after nearly falling to her doom, and without even using moves, she flung around the charizard... something I'm sure shouldn't be possible. The charizard probably felt the same way, as he took a few steps back, and towards Kamina and Spruce... where the next unlikely thing happened. Spruce's plan came into fruition as he jumped off of Kamina's head, and smashed the unsuspecting charizard in the back of the head with a void whip, which seemed to somehow be more than enough to actually knock the thing out. I just stood there, wide-eyed at this plan somehow working. It took me a while to say something, particularly, my mind almost seemed to wait until Spruce was finished with asking Kamina to do that again before it finally let me blurt out "HOW DID THAT WORK!?" that plan, by all accounts should have failed in some way or another... in fact, the bounce plan to get over the bridge probably shouldn't have worked either, and yet... somehow... it happened. Who ARE these pokemon!? How do they actually get plans like these to work? Is that their only skill, making dumb plans and then succeeding just because they didn't know those plans could fail? I thought as I unintentionally skipped a move, only noticing Spruce somehow tank an ice fang from the salamence. Wait... that move should have torn him apart... why is he still standing? Wait... did he maybe... use some sort of stat-increasing move? Is there a move that increases both attack and defense that Spruce can actually learn? I thought as I tried to put together what, exactly happened back there.

---

[Nina]

After Dexter's ember, the swablu fainted, just as its teammate did, earlier. "Not much of a stone wall if they crumbled after two turns, huh?" I said as I continued on, though, I made sure that I wasn't too far ahead of my teammates, particularly, Rebecca, who seemed to be having a difficult time traversing the mountain. Eventually, we came across a familiar lopunny, and the rest of her group... save for the pangoro, who I can only assume evolved recently, and the nidorina, who looked at me and seemed confused about something. She almost asked a question, but the team started walking off again. "Hey!" I shouted to them, which only caused the lopunny to run away from us at full speed. "Agh... well, I'm not going to chase after her, last thing I'd want to do is leave you two behind again," I said as I turned towards my team, the nidorina, who I guess was their client, looking back at me as she ran off with the other group. "Maybe we should take a break, I know at least one of us is tired, already," I said to the group after that, though, what I didn't tell them was the fact that I was getting tired from all of this. I sat down on a nearby rock, and once I took out three apples from my bag, I heard some sort of rustling noise from the behind me. I looked behind me for a moment, but only saw some bushes, and, apparently, nothing in them. I heard some faint laughter behind me, but, again, I couldn't catch whoever, or whatever was making the noise. "Does anyone else hear that? I think someone's following us..." I pointed out as I continued my search for whoever's laughing at us.

---

[Bonnie]

Thankfully, Tini was quick to remember the mission on hand, and he freed us from his oppressive grip, but, as soon as he did, I heard another team approaching, and unfortunately, it was that same team from Sunswept Plains. The nidoran called out to us with "Hey!" but, not wanting to accidentally hurt the ralts with my presence alone, I darted off, and I assumed the rest of the team followed shortly after, well, at the very least, the client did, and once I had to catch my breath, she caught up to me and asked "Say... do you know that nidoran?" I shook my head, and she continued with "Funniest thing... I can't take on this mountain, and that little girl seems to be doing that just fine... not only that, but it seems like she's trying to get to the top. Are explorers really that much stronger than the average pokemon?" I didn't answer, as I was still catching my breath from that sprint that may or may not have separated me from the rest of my team. Once I did catch my breath, I unfortunately forgot the question, and just continued on, ignoring her, and making her a little bit annoyed with me. I then turned around, and even waited for any teammates that I accidentally left behind, just to make sure I wasn't going to continue on alone. "Sorry Eralion... I didn't want to hurt that innocent ralts... I know you said it's probably just junk, and those psychic types back at the mission board were lying, but... what if they weren't? What if my presence alone is enough to hurt a psychic type, let alone one as emotionally sensitive as a ralts? I can't risk that being true, you know... they haven't done anything wrong. I don't want to hurt them,"

Behind the scenes, Spruce was busy... uhm, by the time I got back to seeing him, he was looking a bit unfurled with his leaves. He was still more productive than myself though, hopping off Kamina and organising some team move with him. I observed Spruce and hung back as I shook my magnet, surprised at Spruce's endurance as he hopped off Kamina and touched down onto the puddle, steam rising above the room and obscuring him somewhat. Regardless, he drew out one of his peculiar moves and just absolutely slapped the Charizard away. I swear to Arceus that Snivy did something gimmicky, because he also took a particularly damaging Ice Fang which left barely a scratch on his skin, which was just impossible.

My eye went twitchy before I fainted from the excitement. There was actually a blinding light, as if someone just pointed a flash-light right into my cornea. Because I lost all my vision and thought something was stuck in my eye, I ended up doing a back-flip mid-air and holding some ridiculous ball of light above myself, both magnets held up and drawing streams of light away from myself. "Okay, okay. What in Arceus' domain-" I shrieked as a vacuum developed above myself, a large ball of light arcing towards the Salamence like I just light-bulb artillery. I looked away and gathered myself again, not exactly noticing the lack of black feathers and other strange features on myself at the time.