As Jodie reaches the forest, you get your first look of the town of Argenvers. And if feels like you've stepped into a fairy tale, surrounded by wooden buildings and small paved roads clearly not made for cars.

She stops the jeep in a large parking lot on the edge of town, that cuts the ground like a frontier between the modern world you've traveled in and the old fantasy village you're approaching.

Most of the vehicles in the parking seems to be trucks and pick-ups, and as you watch a pair of men drive a small cart pulling a train of open cargo beds to one of the trucks. "The town has always been close to the forest, and they decided not to allow motor vehicles inside. Those cargo trains are the only alternative to pokemon riding once you're inside." She explains, before leading you to the town's sign.

Jodie points to a building ahead, with a small pokeball sign hanging in front of it. "That's the pokecenter. Bye, and good luck on your challenge!" She says, before heading to a building marked 'general store'.

Jake was impressed by the fairy-tale like setting. He was a bit concerned that the rustic setting would mean his bed would not have a roof over it.  Nevertheless, he was happy to be in civilization of some kind.  First things first, he had pokemon to heal and swap out.

Second thing, since he had money burning a hole in his pocket, he poked his head in various commercial enterprises to spend down his surplus.

New Team:
Fetcher: Farfech'd
Skipper: Marshtomp
Growler: Growlithe
Bandy: Bandicoon
Tiefee
Dimpy: Impidimp

Seymour was in awe of the city's quaintness. It was so charming he almost couldn't believe it. Like Jakey, Seymour went to heal his pokemon, switch out his team, and shop for supplies. He felt some new survival gear would be appropriate. And he could never go wrong with more pokeballs.

When the two of them were all situated, he asked Jakey, "Should we go check out the gym challenge? Or should we wait until tomorrow and do some last minute training tonight?"

---

Shopping for outdoor gear that might be useful during the challenge, as well as looking for more pokeballs.

Changing my team to Shedinja, Lapimage, Dunsparce, Ditto, Pinsir, Farfetch'd.

After a bit of shopping, Seymour finds a brand new knife with miniature survival gear in it's handle. It's pricey, but it's both solid and as versatile as can be. Pokéballs... are another matter. The shop has little of interest to offer, though you do find someone crafting Apricorn balls, at premium price.

OOC: You can drop your Pokédollar by one to increase either your Survival Gear or your Pokéballs by one. To increase both, you'll need to drop your money by two, and spend 15 favors.

Jake, what would you like to shop for?

"Lets wait and chat up the locals. Maybe they can get us a lead on what we will need for the challenge. Like good pokemon to run out and maybe if you need that swag knife there." There did not seem like any particular reason to be in a rush, so Jake was content to delay the challenge.

"Maybe we can head to a hotel and chat and see if we can get any info there, then go do whatever."

Jake was down to train or shop in his free time, but he was most looking forward to a warm place to sleep (indoors).

You find the hotel easily enough, nestled in the shadows of large trees, thanks to the direction a group of traveling trainers. Chatting a bit with them, they tell you they went through the challenge in the last two days.

They say the experience was a lot like a hiking and camping trip, but with the extra risk of various traps along the way. Nothing lethal, but injuries are a serious possibility.

Seymour agreed to Jakey's plan. He listened intently to the descriptions of the gym challenge the traveling trainers gave. Combined with the descriptions the archaeologists gave, a clearer picture of the challenge that awaited them began to form in Seymour's mind. And he thought he might have some ideas for last-minute training.

"I am going to go buy those supplies I spotted earlier. I think they will be worthwhile purchases after all. I... may switch my team up a bit too, now that we know just how likely injuries might be. Then should we train a bit before turning in early? I think we should get some good rest and start the challenge early tomorrow. That way we will be less likely to have to camp overnight outdoors." Granted, Seymour was decent at navigating by the stars.

---

The price was steep, but I am going to go ahead and pay it to get all of the supplies. I think I might alter my team too, but I will think about it some more and post any changes in the ooc thread.

"That's a good idea... maybe I will update my outdoorsy equipment.  If I do have to sleep outdoors, I need to be more comfortable than that time in the swamp."

Jake was a bit unsure of what to buy to improve his survivalist kit, so was eager to get help from the people at the stores and Seymour.

Jake finds a very nice looking thermal sleeping bag, equipped with an odor-less Repel insert to keep the sleeper safe from night attacks.

With your shopping done, you follow the town map to return to the hotel...

And promptly realize you took a wrong turn, as you find yourself surrounded by a set of discreet warehouse, built out of large round logs. Despite how small the town looks, the trees are downright confusing, and you can't figure out how you got here. And just to make things worse, no one seems to be around. Well, no one except for a Dodrio looking at your from over a trash bin.

Seymour checked the Dodrio entry in his Pokedex. "Think that Dodrio has a trainer? It seems they are known to be quite fast..." Without another word, Seymour pulled out Malley, transformed into the shape of the Pokemon before them.

"At the very least, maybe it (or they) could show us how to find out way back out of this part of town. Malley, can you ask for directions?"

Jake had other ideas. Sure, there was a birdo, but there were also lots of warehouses.  Brought Jake back to the days where he occasionally slept in derelict warehouses. Maybe a peek in would rustle some good old memories...
"Imma peek in these buildings. Maybe someone working in them can give us directions."

Jake's true intentions were pretty obvious though. Seymour could immediately tell that Jake was in slinking mode as he looked for a point of entry to the nearest warehouse.

Malley changes shape, but after a first wark, the Dodrio vanishes. You can hear it run off around the corner.

Before you can figure out why, Jake pulls at the closest door... forgetting to check for alarm. It only beeps once, loudly, but it seems it was once too many...

"There it is! With it's trainer!" You turn to see who shouted, and see a security guard throw out a large Torterra to block the alley. "We got you now, you thieves!"

"We... haven't stolen anything," Seymour said, confused. Then it began to dawn on him what exactly was happening. "I think there has been a misunderstanding. We are just trying to ask for directions. We thought the Dodrio that was just here might be able to help, but it ran off. Malley, can you be that Torterra?" He thought that Malley changing shape might lend some credibility to his claim. It seemed the Dodrio they had seen was a wanted criminal or something.

Jake supported Seymour,
"Yeah, I was trying to find someone to ask. I thought someone might be inside. We just got to town and did some shopping. We are getting ready for the gym challenge... do you have any advice?"

The security guard looks at you two suspiciously. "Just cause that wasn't the Dodrio doesn't mean it's not yours. And..."

He's cut short when other guards shout from behind you. "It's over here!"

The guard looks behind you, before glaring again. "Alright, you get off easy this time. But I'll be keeping an eye on you..." And with that, he runs back out of the alley, before turning right.

With the near-miss, Jake's yearning for a good snooping faded.  They were also still a bit lost,
"Maybe lets just follow the guard, maybe they will get us to a main street... or eventually tell us how to get to the inn.  Or we can just wander around. No one will mess with us trainers, even if the streets are a bit shady."

"That sounds like a good plan," Seymour agreed. He didn't exactly like the idea of following the people who had falsely (mostly) accused them of crimes, but he had to admit that it was probably their best chance to stop being lost. Not to mention he was curious about what they planned to do to that Dodrio...

You follow after the guard, who recalled his giant turtle to move more quickly. Judging by how quickly he's running, he must be really eager to stop that Dodrio...

A loud crash above you makes you pause, as glass showers over you. Looking up, you see the bird you're chasing break out of a window, with a small shape on it's back. It kicks off the building across the street from you, before landing in the middle of it and racing away.

OOC: If you want to catch up to it, you'll have to move fast! What do you do?

"Or we could chase the birdo!" Jake's enthusiastic voice suggested that was his preferred course of action. Well, not only his voice, he also broke into a dash into the direction the bird went.  He didn't have a ride pokemon ready to go, but he trusted his own feet and street-sense could do well in a chase down the town roads.

Knowing he had no chance of keeping up with Jakey on foot, Seymour turned to Malley again. "Can you be that Dodrio again? Let's try to catch up together," he suggested. If his Ditto's transformation was successful, Seymour would climb upon it's back and give chase.

Regardless, Seymour also released his Verdakeet into the air above. "Try and keep tabs on that Dodrio from the sky!" he called out to Sunny. Seymour wasn't 100% sure why they were giving chase, but he agreed with Jakey that it felt like the correct course of action.

Seymour climbs on his transformed Malley, you set off after the fleeing Dodrio. You see your prey jump on a rather steep roof, one that would be hard to climb. Still, with Seymour's bird flying above, you could follow after it on the ground. If only there wasn't an electric train in the way...

OOC: I'm using Paizo's Chase Cards for this race, so you'll have to beat various obstacles to catch up with the Dodrio and it's rider. Right now, you're dealing with either climbing the rooftop, or bypassing the train. Just pick your path, and tell me how you want to deal with the obstacle.

For clarification, the 'train' looks kind of like that:
https://www.ironplanet.com/for...-Cart-Nevada/4827797
It's pulling a series of flat, side-less wagon with cardboard boxes on them.

Jake didn't know the town well or have a good enough connection with Seymour's pokemon to feel comfortable taking a different path than the dodrio.  So, Jake did his best to follow the pokemon directly, only making deviations to accommodate his human features and optimize the route a bit more that the big bird could. He was not confident he could catch up, but like a growlith chasing cars, the effort was often more fun than the reward.

Seymour wasn't at all confident he would be able to climb the roof, so he opted to navigate the train obstacle instead. His sharp mind quickly concocted a strategy.

"Sunny! Swoop down and give me a boost to jump this thing!" His bird was too small to ride, but a short little trip would certainly be doable. When he was lifted skyward, Seymour returned Malley to its pokeball, then released it again on the opposite side of the train for him to land on.

Then he could continue the chase atop Malley, and Sunny could resume tracking from the sky.

Sunny pulls Seymour up and above the pile of boxes, before dropping him back on Malley. Jake follows close after, ready to do the same... until he realizes he doesn't have a pokémon out to pull him up. With a yell, he stumbles as he climbs the moving cart, before bursting through the wall of thankfully light boxes.

Looking to the side, you see your target slip down the other side of the roof, before climbing the next one. The wall on the building it's about to get on seems rather easy to climb (it's made of somewhat crudely cut logs), or you could keep running down the street...

Despite the stumble, Jake still felt he was doing alright keeping up without a pokemon.  Good thing the boxes seemed to be empty.  Catching sight of the target, Jake determined it was worth it to risk climbing up the crude logs. He'd encountered stacked logs on occasion before and knew they could be treacherous to climb, so he approached with that in mind -- albeit without much caution. Maybe when they were stacked into a wall they rolled around less. It seemed like it would be a bit odd if someone made a wall out of a material that would just roll away.

"I got the roof, you get the street?"

Jake didn't want to give orders to Seymour, but he thought it would be good if they took different angles... and Jake was pretty sure he could leap from roof to roof better than Seymour, even if the latter was assisted with pokemon.

"Sounds like a plan," Seymour agreed. He directed Malley in the correct direction and broke away from Jakey. This chase was pretty exciting! He had no idea what they would do if they actually caught their target though. He would figure that out if/when it actually happened.

Jake struggles a bit to climb the wall, but still reaches the rooftop. It did give the  Dodrio a bit more advance unfortunately, but as you look ahead, you see it take a turn to the left.
The direct path along the roof would be slow going, but you notice a window close to you leading inside the warehouse you're on. And inside, crossing the entire building, you notice a horizontal crane currently in use. If you could get the operator's attention, he could get you across the building quickly. On the other hand, you could just try to maneuver through the rafters to get across...

Seymour shouts at Jake, only to get surprised by a sudden jump by Malley. You didn't notice the rather large pothole in the middle of the street, but you manage to hold on to your mount as you race on. You start gaining on your opponents, only for them to suddenly turn away from you.
You turn into a small alleyway to stay close, but it turns out the alley is filled with clutter. Malley could probably climb over them, if they're stable enough to not collapse. On the other hand, the pile is loose enough that you may be able to slip between two of the pallets to get through...

Jake cut into the warehouse, but didn't have a perfect idea of how to 'persuade' the operator quickly. Then again, he did have something showing authority, well, not really authority, but at this distance it probably -looked- like something that gave him authority.  Jake released growler, gave a quick whistle, and grabbed one of his badges from his pocket and flashed it quickly towards the crane operator,

"Official business, help me cross!"
The suspiciously young 'official' called.

Jakey did some quick mental calculations concerning the upcoming pile and soon realized there was only one logical decision to be made (other than giving up the chase entirely). Since he did not have great athletic ability of his own and Malley was using a mostly untested form, he knew that attempting to climb the pile could end in a dangerous disaster. And so, "Malley, let's squeeze between all that debris. Speedily but safely."

The warehouse worker seems confused, as he shouts back to Jake. After a bit of back and forth, he finally starts moving the crane close to you, but it's slow. (Though you could speed it up for 12 favors)
You cross the crane, and return to the rooftops on the other side... right next to a Beedrill nest.

Seymour has a hard time getting through the pile, something not helped by the large form Malley currently has. Once on the other side, he locates the fleeing thieves on the other side, but see they're running along a busy path on the edge of the warehouse district.
(How do you want to navigate the traffic?)

Seymour put two fingers in his mouth and whistled loudly when he saw the traffic in order to get his Verdakeet's attention. "Sunny, use Grass Whistle on that Dodrio. All three heads. Malley, let's navigate this traffic swiftly but safely." Instead of rushing quickly into a hazardous situation, Seymour had opted to try and slow the fleeing pokemon instead. He just hoped all of the Dodrio's heads could be made to slumber at the same time.

---

Does Malley have any Dodrio moves that might help navigate the traffic?

Jake waited impatiently for the crane to get him across, then nearly jumped off the building in surprise at the beedrill nest. Given beedrills were a pest at home, he wasn't too terrified, but nearly running into one was a not-great idea. He didn't know exactly where the thieves went, so he just made his best guess and ran away from the beedrill nest.

Sunny tries to put the Dodrio to sleep, but it's an Early Bird, and very resistant to that status effect. On the other hand, you also realize Dodrio knows Pursuit. Your target is too far for Maley to target it with that move, so instead you focus it on one of the faster cart, helping you to speed through the path, and close in the gap with the Dodrio. You just have to navigate the two workers carrying a very big window...

Jake runs away from the nest, fast enough that the buzzing behind him doesn't catch up. You can see the Dodrio ahead, with Sunny trying to slow it down. You just have to get across the street blocking your way. You could try to jump on a passing cart, or you could try crossing using a line tied across the street. You pretty confident it's not a power line... and it's covered in black rubber, so it should be safe, right?

Seeing that putting the fleeing Dodrio to sleep wasn't having the intended effect, he called up to his flying plant-bird, "Sunny, try using Leech Seed instead!" It definitely wouldn't be as helpful as lulling the Dodrio to sleep, but hopefully it would at least help a little.

Unfortunately Seymour had more immediate concerns to focus on though. There was a big window in the way. No time to stop and go around, and jumping over was not in the cards right now. Which left one option. "Malley, un-transform and we'll slide under!" Seymour was no sportsman, but he did his best baseball slide as his pokemon shrank beneath him. If his gambit didn't end in disaster, he would have Malley change into the Dodrio again on the opposite side so that they could continue their chase.

Pretty confident to Jake meant it was all systems go!  Plus, he'd seen enough people shocked by electric type pokemon to know electricity was an inconvenience, not a true danger. Still, he didn't want to fall, so he approached the line and tested the strength before trying to rip over the street in hot pursuit.  If close enough, he'd re-release growler and release bandy. Growler to pick up the scent with odor slueth and bandy to try to keep up with the fleeing bird.

As Sunny launches his attack, Seymour slides under the glass, barely. Looking back, you see Malley has returned to his normal form... but not fast enough to slide under the glass. Instead, you watch it slam against the window, turning into a big smear while it looks at you, confused.
Glancing back at the Dodrio, you could probably get close enough to command Sunny into fighting it, if you don't wait for your Ditto to get himself back together...

Jake finds the cable strong enough to hold him, and crosses like a trained acrobat. Before sending out Growler, you spot the Dodrio getting attacked by Sunny, close enough that Bandy can run in and join the fight.

You can give your orders to Sunny and Bandy to start fighting, and end the chase!

Seymour looked to the Dodrio, then back at his smooshed Ditto, then back at the Dodrio again. In the end, he would have felt too bad about leaving Malley after all the Pokemon had just done for him, so he returned to help peel the Pokemon off the glass. The battle could wait a few more moments.

---

I think Jakey can handle the first round of the battle on his own. I don't want to leave Malley behind. Poor pokemon!

"Bandy, use thief on the thief!" Jake ordered.  He wasn't sure what the dodrio and its rider was after, but he was going to find out!  If the move succeeded, Jake would direct Bandy to proceed to feint attack.

The Dorio's rider, a small person wearing a tattered cloak, jumps off their pokemon as Bandy approaches. Before she can strikes, the three heads of the Dodrio scours the warehouse's roof with beams of fire and frost. Bandy dodges most of them, only to get clipped by an electric blast. Not bad enough to harm her, but you can see her twitch as she fights her paralysis. She still manages to hit with her own attack, swiping away what looks like a palm-sized medallion.

Meanwhile, Seymour takes a while to pull Malley away from the window, while the movers holds the glass in place (and give snarky suggestions that you should use a scrapper). Once he's freed, you turn your attention back to the Dodrio on the roof, as fires it's Tri-Beam at Bandy.

"Malley, take a good rest in your pokeball. You've earned it." Seymour returned the Ditto to its ball, then turned his attention to the battle at hand.

As he rushed toward the conflict, Seymour called out orders to his Verdakeet. "Sunny, Quick Attack! Follow it up with some Bullet Seeds!" The leafy bird might have been at a slight type disadvantage, but he still believed in Sunny's capabilities. Especially when teaming up with Bandy.

The Dodrio rushes Bandy, bowling her over before kicking her off of the roof. It's then distracted by Sunny's attack. It stomps about the roof, dodging Sunny's bullets, only to be struck by Bandy as she swings back on up with ease, unbothered by the bird's attack. Before the triple bird brain can figure out what's happening, Bandy whacks it again and knocks it out.

"Trio!" The Dodrio's rider, a young girl it seems, runs up to the knocked out bird.

Jake retrieved the medallion and took a look at it before returning bandy and growler to their pokeballs. He then approached the thief, hands on hips,
"You almost got us into a lot of trouble. What is your deal anyway. Also, we are trying to find our hotel."

He then glanced at Seymour, unsure what to question her on beyond what he already did.

Seymour nodded. "Yeah, why were all of those warehouse workers so desperate to catch you?" While he waited for the answer, he congratulated Sunny on a job well done and returned the Pokemon to its pokeball.

The girl pouts, sitting next to her knocked out bird. "They don't like me going through their warehouse... I mean, they've got so much stuff, they can't really miss a box of food every once in a while..."

Despite what she says, the medallion Bandy grabbed is definitely not food.


She shrugs when you hold it up. "A weird guy asked for it. He said it was in a special crate on the side, and he'd give me plenty of stuff for it."

"Food is nice, but this looks better," Jake quipped.

He felt a bit bad about chasing and knocking out the girl's pokemon, so he decided to be generous,
"Lets get you some food and call it even."

"Yeah, I am sure we can spare a bit of food," Seymour agreed. "Your Dodrio alone has three mouths to feed." He peered over Jakey's shoulder to see if he could identify what was so special about the medallion. If he could identify it, he would let Jakey know what he knew.

You're not really an expert on jewelry, so you have a hard time figuring out what those gems are. The body of the amulet seems to be made of polished iron, rather than a precious metal, and you don't see the kind of modern markings you'd expect from mass produced trinkets.

The girl looks like she wants to protest, but a rumble from her belly is enough to get her to reconsider. Thankfully, Seymour has enough reserve to sate her appetite. But the way she's eating, she's probably homeless.

Seymour didn't know what to make of the medallion, but had a hunch it was more important than it seemed. But to him, it was currently just a random curio.

"What did you say your name was again?" Seymour asked the girl. "I am Seymour. Seymour Mons. If food is all you really want, why not stick with us? I am pretty good at scrounging up food in the wild, and we seem to get other meals provided to us on a fairly regular basis as well." He reminisced for a moment about the tasty banquet after the swarm challenge, and that neat restaurant they went to the first night they spent at a city in this region.

"Not sure how Falkner feels about it, but I think it could be fun to have another fellow trainer to travel the world with, if you are up for it. We just gotta win the local gym challenge first though." Seymour showed his badge collection to emphasize his seriousness about the claim.

Jake nodded,
"Seymour can scrounge up food in the wild, I guess, but we usually just eat good food given to us. We are basically celebrities that no one has heard of."

Jake definitely didn't mind having another roguish companion; after all, he used to run with a gang back in the day, so it was almost nostalgic!

"If you tag along, I can see if any of my pokemon take a shine to you too. I have too many to keep trained, so maybe we can get you another poke-pal"

"I'm Phoebe." She says while eating. "But... I don't know. I kinda like being free to do whatever I want in my woods... Although it's getting kinda cold these days...

So you guys are trainers?"

"Guilty as charged, well, of being a trainer, definitely not of anything else." Jake lied.

"I'm Faulkner, nice to meet you," Jake lied again.

"No pressure on joining up. But we've had a lot of fun running with the locals here. We even got a boat ride with one. You'll get to see a lot of crazy things too! Like, I am sure this town is nice and all. I been in your shoes before, but it was definitely worth it to take a chance! Look where I am now!"

Jake spun around to demonstrate his relatively hip attire. Well, maybe he needed to work on his fashion sense, but he now had enough money to develop a personal style. That was nice! While Jake wasn't too desperate to have her come along, he was getting a sense that Cadien was a pretty complicated place, so having a local with could potentially clear up any misunderstandings that happen -- or maybe create more misunderstandings.

Seymour nodded along with Jakey's description of their travels. "In the end, the choice is all up to you. But do note that life with us on the road will be anything but uneventful. Not sure if that is a positive or a negative for you."

Phoebe thinks for a moment, munching on a piece of Slowpoke tail bacon, before answering. "Mm... why not. I guess I could take a trip for a while. I can't help you with your gym challenge, but I can show you the way back to your hotel."

As she leads you there, she gives you a glimpse of her lifestyle, as she describes how she sometimes dumpster dive at the hotel for thorn clothes or discarded linen. Trio has recovered enough to walk, though he'll need a trip to the Pokémon Center for a check up. As far as you can tell, Phoebe doesn't have a pokéball for him.

Seymour nodded, thankful to have someone who knew their way around town and could show them the way back to the hotel.

"Your Dodrio has no PokeBall?" Seymour asked when he noticed. A moment later he realized it might have been rude to ask, but it was already too late for that. "I could give you one if you would like. Regardless, how did the two of you (four of you?) become friends?"

She shrugs. "I never used any balls. Trio took care of me for as long as I remember. Some people tried to catch Trio, or to get me to live in town with some strangers, but the few times I tried were just awful. So I just stayed with Trio in the forest. Getting some things like medicine can be rough, but it's better than dealing with adults."

You reach the Pokemon Center soon enough, and get your teams checked up. The nurse raises an eyebrow when she sees Phoebe, but doesn't question her presence when you present her Dodrio.

As she steps away to take care of your Pokemon, Phoebe asks "so you said you're not locals? Where do you come from?"

"I'm from Kanto, one of the cities there, you probably wouldn't know it." Jake figured people in Cadien were just as ignorant of Kanto cities as he was of Cadien ones.

"Yeah, I don't always know how to feel about pokeballs, it feels a bit mean, but at the same time, the pokemon don't really seem to mind. Well, they are always ready to fight when they come out so maybe it does put them in a bad mood."

"Pretty cool that you can live outside of town. I basically never left my city in all my time before I came out here. Being outside at night with no buildings around is a bit scary, so it has been really nice to travel with someone." Jake then offered a high-five to Seymour, the MVP of travelling companions.

Seymour returned Jakey's high five with gusto, then said, "I am from the Hoenn region myself. My family owns a patch of land near the safari zone there. In fact, a large portion of my family actually works at the safari zone itself." He wasn't sure if people in Cadien knew what a safari zone was, but he didn't bother elaborating unless asked.

"So, now that we aren't lost and our pokemon pals are healed, should we rest up for the remainder of the day, or do some training? Training together could be a great way to get to know eachother better, since we will be traveling together," he suggested, mostly to their new friend. But if Phoebe wasn't interested, relaxing had its benefits too.

"Training? Is that something trainers do?" She pauses for a moment, before facepalming. "Trainer, training, duh. Right, never mind me. Sure let's try it."

Phoebe leads you to a garage's parking lot near the warehouse area, assuring you that no one bothered going there in the evening. With the smell of used oil in the background, you send out your pokemon.

Training with Trio showed you just how fast this bird is. Like, absurdly fast. Enough that none of your pokemon can really keep up. As you practice though, you get the idea of trying to use his speed to help your own pokemon. By 'hitching a ride' with a faster partner, your own pokemon can move faster.

OOC: Pick three of your pokemon each, and give them the Hitch a Ride ability.
Hitch a Ride (When close to an ally that is faster, user gets half the difference as a bonus, up to +2)
Also, you gain 15 favor points for catching and befriending the thief!

The next day, Phoebe shows you to the town's base so you can challenge them. As you're escorted to the briefing room, you notice the guards aren't carrying guns, but bows. In fact, you realize you can't smell the acrid smoke of black powder that was omnipresent in every other bases you visited.

"Good day, trainers." A tall woman with black hair, wearing a simple flat-green uniform, steps into the room not long after you sit down. "I'm Lieutenant Maya Hughe. I understand you're here to challenge us?"

After training for a bit, Jake was seriously impressed with the trio's speed.
"Yeah, if we weren't training, we wouldn't be as good as we are now! I mean, honestly, I could probably coast for a while, but it is a good way to pass the time and feel smart when you come up with new ideas."

After the night, Jake also took Herman and verdakeet's pokeball and offered them to Pheobe,
"While we are at the challenge you can see if these two take a liking to you. I like them, of course, but it feels a bit bad for them to not be my favorite, but still having them. If they like you more, I think you can be a better friend to them."

When they got to the base, Jake saluted the tall woman,
"Hi there, Yes we are here to challenge! Ready to be whipped into shape!"

Jake opted to keep mostly the same team as he had before, just swapping out Dimpy for Fairy -- after all, it felt appropriate to bring a bug into the forest:
Fetcher: Farfech'd
Skipper: Marshtomp
Growler: Growlithe
Bandy: Bandicoon
Tiefee
Fairy: Larfae

Seymour was happy with the results of their training. Having Phoebe around was already paying off better than anticipated!

The next day at the base, Seymour nodded to both Lieutenant Maya Hughe and Jakey's comments. "Ready as I will ever be," Seymour said. He was ready to begin!

---

Added the 15 favors. Gave Hitch a Ride to Lombre, Shedinja, and Castform. I will keep my team the same.

"Glad to hear that. I hope you've got good shoes, because you have a hike ahead of you!" She writes a set of GPS coordinates on the board. "This is your first destination. At those coordinates, you'll find a box like this." She sets a green and red box on the table. "As you can see, it's partly camouflaged. So you'll need to search for it. Inside, you'll find a keycard with another set of coordinates. Those will lead you to an old base. Use the card on the reader there, and you'll have completed the challenge! Simple, right?"

She looks smiling and cheerful, but there's a hint of mischief in her smile.

"Sounds simple," Seymour agreed. Although his tone implied he expected it to be anything but.

He looked to Jakey, then back to the lieutenant. "Is there anything else we should know before heading out? Like, terms of failure, forbidden tactics, or areas that are out of bounds? If not, I am eager to get started right away."

Jake wasn't really sure how coordinates worked, so he hoped Seymour did. Jake also wanted to get started, but he was a bit uncertain.
"Can I show each of my pokemon the box so they can recognize it when they see it? I trust their eyes better than mine sometimes!"

"Of course." Maya says, before turning to Seymour. "There are no forbidden are or tactics, though if you end up leaving the forest, it means you went completely the wrong way. Oh, and we will loan you each a flare gun, for emergency use. Using it means you forfeit the challenge, and want to be pulled out immediately."

Along with the two bright orange plastic pistol, she hands you a small box. It has a display on the side, showing two sets of eight numbers, one marked N and the other E, and various straps and buckles so it can be strapped to a limb or hung from your belt or pack. "This is your GPS for the challenge. It already tells you where you are, you just have to use it to reach your goal."

You see the first two digits of each coordinates on the board matches that of the GPS, and the rest of them isn't that different. Of course, having never used a GPS, you're not sure how far that small difference is in reality...

Seymour took the flare gun and awkwardly tucked it in with his things. A weapon of any type was outside of his comfort zone, but he understood its potential usefulness in an emergency. He took the GPS device and strapped it on with much more confidence. He had never used one before, but he was pretty sure he could figure it out.

"I believe I am ready then," Seymour said. He released his Verdakeet to accompany them at the beginning. "Shall we begin?"

Jake grabbed the tools provided, not showing any affinity to either. With this challenge, he didn't feel a spurt of adrenaline like he did previously -- maybe because he knew it was going to be a long trip instead of a short challenge. Nevertheless, he stoically released Fetcher, and Bandy. Both had good eyes and a certain level of cunning, and he was expecting the challenge not to play fair -- traps, ambushes, and who knows what else lay before them.

Maya waves at you as you leave the base, heading in a north-westernish direction. The weather is a bit cold, but nothing you can't handle. It's easy enough to find small trails that lets you travel trough the woods, though after an hour, you find yourself having to make a choice.

Your path to the north-west grows wetter and muddier, looking more like a swamp than a trail. As you consider how to cross, Bandy tugs at Jake's jacket, before pointing at a tree. On it is an old carving. Behind it, you see there's a small trail, heading to the south-west.

Jake patted Bandy on the head and pointed the sign and trail to Seymour,
"Nice work. Looks like someone marked their turf. Lets check it out, probably a better route than the big old bog.  And make a mark of our own!"

Jake signaled to bandy to express its artistic vision on the tree, then catch up as he started down the path to the south-west.

"This isn't so bad!" Jake remarked cheerily to Seymour.

Seymour called his Verdakeet closer as he pondered the crossroads. On the one hand, the new trail seemed to be going a bit off-course. On the other hand, the most direct rout would probably also be the most hazardous for this challenge. "I think your instincts are probably right, Falkner. Let's follow that trail for a while. Hopefully we won't veer too far off-course though. Regardless, let's have Sunny make the trail sunny for us. That way we will be more likely to spot any traps hidden in the shadows. Hopefully." He sent his bird Pokemon back into the sky to intensify the sunlight.
This message was last edited by the player at 22:12, Fri 11 Feb 2022.

You follow the small path through the trees, seeing a pair of Skorupi scattering through the bushes, scared off by Sunny's sunlight. After a while, you find a small, nearly overgrown clearing. You search a bit for another path, only to find an old stone covered by vegetation.

At it's base, you find a text engraved on the stone base.
And so, the prince fought in the foreign land, but could not defeat the local rulers and their celestial dragon.
But the two rulers disagreed on whether Truth or Ideals should rule, and in their disagreement, split their dragon in twain.
The prince found the place where the dragon split, and discovered the dragon's split left a third part, one of neither Truth nor Ideals.
The remnants of the dragon acknowledged our prince, and returned with him to Cadien, honoring the royal family with it's power.

Jake was puzzled by the monument. He attempted to read it, but quickly got lost among the words, so he turned to Seymour,
"I can't make heads or tails of this. Is it some sort of a riddle? A grave? Maybe if you read it aloud it would make more sense..."

Jake didn't want to admit he was having a hard time reading. He felt he had done a pretty good job covering up his near illiteracy to this point, so he didn't want to go embarrassing himself now.

"Good idea," Seymour replied, then began reading aloud. It did seem to help, but not as much as he had hoped. "It seems this is a legend of this region. The origin story of some kind of Pokemon connected to the royal family. I don't think it is related to our challenge, but I am going to take some pictures just in case." Seymour snapped pictures from all angles, and made sure he could read the text in his images as well. He also jotted down their current GPS coordinates, in case it became relevant.

Once finished, the trainer looked around for any trails they might want to follow, or any other ruins to be uncovered.

Despite your search, you can't find any trail leading away. You do find a strange symbol on the side of the stone, though.


What do you choose? Cutting through the forest, or going back to the marsh?

As Jake listened to the inscription read aloud, he thought it was mostly just fluff, but drew some inspiration from it,
"I think it is saying we should take a path that isn't clear. Well, and I really don't want to go back to marching through marshes."

Jake wasn't sure if he was right... maybe the trail would branch later if they followed down the marsh and there would be a hidden third option. He also wasn't able to make heads or tails of the strange symbol.

"Its really up to you. I don't know... maybe the marshes are the best bet for now."

"I think the marshes are the expected path," Seymour mused. "Cutting through the forest might be more difficult, but I would bet there will be fewer traps set up that way. I say we head through the forest. I would rather keep my socks dry if possible." The trainer made sure he had a good picture of the symbol they had found, then followed his GPS in the correct direction through the forest. He had Sunny keep things sunny for them, same as before.

Getting through the brushes is hard going, but you persevere... slowly. Sunny does a good job of lighting your path, until Fetcher flies down and signals you to get down. You have just a moment to hide, before you hear some voices coming toward you.

"I thought there was a risk of rain today? It seems like there's not a cloud in the sky."

"Meh, you know how bad meteo predictions can be. Now help me set this up. Hold the honey."

Glancing down a small ledge, you see a couple of soldiers making a kind of dead-fall trap. One that would drop a ball filled with honey on anyone tripping it.

As Seymour watched the soldiers work, a thought suddenly occurred to him. He moved close enough to whisper to Jakey so that he could run the idea by him. "These guys know where the traps are. If they head in the direction we are going, maybe we should follow them for a while to avoid falling into any. Think that might work?"

Jake shrugged,
"Well, so long as they are going in the direction we are and we track their moves really neat, then yeah. They might know a hidden wire to step over, and we might walk right into it if we don't stick close enough behind them."

It seemed as good of plan as any, though he did want some of that honey. When they were a safe distance away, he signaled to fetcher,
"Hey, can you go back and grab that honey for us so we can snack on the way?"

"Do you think they'll come into our sector?"

"Maybe. It looked like they were going to the marsh when they left the town."

"Ugh... I hate it when they get stuck there. It takes forever to clean my team after those battle..."

With that, they leave to the east, likely toward the bog that you avoided. While you consider whether to follow them or not, Fetcher comes back to you, carefully holding the fragile ball filled with honey.

"Nice. You actually managed to get the honey. I'm impressed." He watched the soldiers leaving and made some quick mental calculations. After a few moments, he said to Jakey, "Looks like they probably aren't going the direction we would want to follow anyway. I suggest that we continue walking across the forest. Probably don't want to follow their trail in the opposite direction either, since they likely stopped at other traps before this one." If that sounded agreeable to Jakey, Seymour would continue cutting across the wilderness, avoiding any well established trails when possible.

Jake gingerly gets the ball of honey from Fetcher and ponders how to get the honey out without making too much of a mess. He partially agreed with Seymour, and partially was good enough for him,
"Yeah, but I think we might end up walking off a cliff if we aren't careful. Nature makes traps herself, you know? But yeah, lets keep goin' offroad! Just still keep our eyes and ears open."

Trekking through the undergrowth did give Jake a newfound appreciation for trails at least. He wondered if there were no traps on the trail how much quicker they could have been.

You walk along the cliff line, but after a while, you notice the cliff is getting taller, and just getting taller ahead of you. You could keep going, but it could be hard to get back down to head north further ahead.

You could go down right now, while the cliff isn't too high, but the rocks here seems rather slippery... and scratched, for some reason.

A safer alternative would be to turn back a bit, in a part of the forest that is quite tangled, making for an easier climb down. Although you're sure you've seen some movement through the branches...

Jake started to regret not bringing Rusty along. Then he wouldn't need to worry about the cliff one way or another. He wasn't quite sure what to make of the decision. It seemed like they should be heading down the cliff, but the scratches on the rock concerned him. Maybe there was some beastly pokemon lying it wait down there. He turned to Seymour,
"I could ask Fairy to string shot up the way down here to make it less slippery so it will be safer, but messier... or maybe we just keep going and hope for the best.  Do you have your flier with you?  I left rusty in the pokecenter.  I don't want to get stranded at the top of the cliff though and hike all the way back. Seems like a waste of time."

"I have three pokemon that can fly, but only one that is a flying type. My Shedinja, Castform, and Verdakeet. But I also have my Ditto, so it is almost like I have two Verdakeet. I don't think I can fly with them, but I bet if they worked together they could help us glide down at a safe speed. Still, if Fairy could make us a string shot net at the bottom or something, that would make me feel a lot better about pressing forward for now." Seymour was also not very interested in backtracking if it could be avoided.

"Additionally, I thought I saw some movement in the branches back there too. And with these scratches on the rocks here... I think pressing forward might actually be the correct decision, and not just the enticing one."

You keep traveling along the ridge, getting a good look at the forest north of you. There's not much to serve as landmarks, but you do notice a small stream waving through it. After a while, you notice movements ahead of you through the trees.

Luckily, bellow you, you notice the forest give way to a small clearing. The herbs there are low enough that you can see there's not Pokémon moving about, insuring that Sunny wouldn't glide you down into an ambush if you decide to head down here.

"I guess here is as good a place as any to get down" Jake shrugged as he released fetcher,

"I think fetcher can get me down in one piece..." Jake then looked to fetcher and Seymour for confirmation.

Seymour called down sunny, then released Malley too. "I sure hope so. Otherwise this might hurt. Let's glide down." He turned to his ditto. "Malley, if you would be so kind, transform into one of these two birds. Your choice. Then help us out if we get into trouble on the way down."

And with that, Seymour grabbed his Verdakeet's legs, swallowed his fear, then aimed his buddy toward the clearing below. "Hope the clearing isn't trapped!" he said as an afterthought. But he had already started his descent.

As Seymour mentions that possibility, you look down at the plants that draw closer. They don't have any flowers, just groups of three egg-shaped leaves on short stems.

"Eggsecute?!" Jake cried on his way down. He wasn't sure, but if that was the case, it was potentially a bad deal. Not feeling there was enough time to confer with Seymour on the ideal plan of action, Jake released growler to the ground ahead of them,

"Roar to clear the landing zone!"
Sure, it might stir up trouble, but it beats being mobbed the instant of touchdown.

If Seymour had had a free hand, he would have tried using his Pokedex. But instead he used his eyes, doing his best to identify any pokemon that fit the description of what they were looking at.

"Good idea," he said to Jakey as he managed to release Growler. He then shared any insights from his observations.

Growler appears in the clearing, landing in the plants. They seem to reach up to her belly. She sniff at them curiously, but you don't see anything moving. You land not long after.

Now that you're almost knee-deep in them, you recognize the plants. It's poison ivy.

"Ah! Poison ivy!" Seymour yelped, holding his arms high and staying stiff as a board. He was just glad he was wearing pants. "Malley, Sunny, stay airborne. Nobody let these leaves touch your skin. And don't even touch your clothes when we get out of this patch. Falkner, you have any clever ideas for getting out of this patch, or do we gotta do it the normal way? By wading through and hoping for the best."

Jake didn't recognize 'Poison Ivy' as a pokemon,
"You mean ivysaur? I don't see any around here. I don't see why we can't just walk through..."

Maybe the plants were poison? But he didn't see any purple clouds come up from them when they landed, so maybe it was a really really subtle poison.  Even if Seymour was just making things up, Jake wanted to alleviate his companion's concern. For a moment, he considered using growler to burn the plants, but even a city slicker like himself was wise enough to not start an uncontrolled forest fire. So, he opted to release skipper,
"Time to get dirty, mud sport to coat all the plants and push them to the ground!"

Skipper jumps out, ready to trash about to spread some mud.

OOC: Do you want to call Growler back, before he gets covered in mud?

Jake forgot to retrieve growler!  Time for puppers to play in the mud.

Soon, you are all covered in mud, surrounded by broken plants. With that, you quickly make your way out of the clearing, and back toward the coordinates.

You make good head-way, until you reach a stream, heading in the same general direction as you. You can see some wider trails going near it, but it seems like some prime area for traps. You could wade into the stream instead, though that would mean getting wet... but it would help clean up the mud.

After Skipper mudded the area, Seymour exited the hazardous landscape as gingerly as possible, keeping his arms high and touching as little plant material as possible. He advised Jakey to try and to the same.

When they reached the water, Seymour wasted no time wading into it. He wanted to remove any lingering poison from his clothes as soon as possible. The cold water soaking into his pants was unpleasant, but probably not as unpleasant as it would be to be covered in poison ivy. As he scrubbed (but not with his bare hands!), he asked, "Should we risk the trail for a bit? Go cautiously and see what kind of traps might be there? Or we could go up the stream itself. You've got Skipper and I have Captain Lombre."

Jake still didn't fully understand the concept of poison ivy, so he stomped out of the patch without much hesitation, shooting Seymour a funny look at the other boy's strange fear of this area.

At the water, Jake also was happy to get all the mud off of him, and encouraged growler to do the same. While washing off, he nodded along with Seymour's plan,
"Yeah, I just hope there are no waterfall traps."

Jake had heard of waterfalls, but never really seen one. He knew they were by rivers, and this was kind of like a river. It was a bit small, but maybe it could have one? Thinking of waterfalls made him think of another natural hazard he had heard of and was quite frankly scary as all heck: quicksand. Thankfully, they didn't seem to be near a desert, the obvious location for quicksand.

"What is a waterfall trap?" Seymour asked with honest curiosity. He wondered if it was a type of potential hazard he had been overlooking. The trainer looked up and down the stream and kept an eye out for any signs of something that might fit the description. He was too busy looking for traps and washing himself to notice that Jakey was probably going to end up with a horrible rash himself.

He also returned Malley to its pokeball and had Captain Lombre join Sunny outside instead. The lilypad pokemon could help navigate the water while Sunny continued keeping watch up above. (And continued keeping the weather sunny.)

Walking through the stream is a slow progress, but it seems no one thought of trapping that area. As a result, you cover a good distance to your goal. All you need to do, is cross a small patch of forest.

As you walk between the bushes, you suddenly spot a thin wire between the leaves, at about knee height.

Jake wasn't entirely sure what a waterfall trap would be but entertained his imagination as they trudged through the stream,
"I think a waterfall trap is where you are just walking through water normally, then you take another step and woosh! The water is way deeper and suddenly going really fast, then in a few moments you go sailing down a waterfall and crash at the bottom!"

It actually sounded kinda absurd when he said it aloud, so he felt it was pretty unlikely to encounter a waterfall trap. Nevertheless, he was happy to be back on dirt.  Well, happy enough until he spotted the wire which he pointed out to Seymour immediately,
"Wow, it took us this long to find just one trap.  So, these guys are pro's, so I wouldn't be surprised if we are being watched right now and there may be some backup traps. Like, if we just step over that trap, there might be another trap right on the other side that we don't see."

Despite going offroad and in the stream, Jake felt like they were doing pretty well,
"Then again, if all their traps do is dump honey on us, I wouldn't mind triggering it just to see what happens. They seem more silly than dangerous!" Jake gave a bit of a laugh, turning to Seymour to see if he thought that it was a completely dumb idea.

"I mean, we don't need to hit the string ourselves, we can use a ranged attack to trigger. Or just carefully avoid it. That's probably the best choice... but less fun!"

"A trapped trap?" Seymour hadn't considered the possibility that the traps might have multiple layers to them, like Jakey suggested. He was about to acknowledge Jakey's cleverness when the guy then mentioned setting the trap off on purpose "just to see what happens." That sounded like the opposite of clever to Seymour...

"Uhhh... How about we get around this trap first. Then, if you really want to, you can throw a rock or something behind us to set off the trap and see what it does. That way if we have to run, at least we can run in the direction of our goal."

You move slowly around a tree, finding a thin path leading to a stump, with the box you're looking for just sitting there. Before taking the bait, though, you spot a camouflaged box stuck on the far side of a tree you'd have to pass next to. You can't tell what it does from where you are, but you notice the small black circle that usually mark a motion tracker, about at chest level.

Jake gave an overly dramatic sigh to Seymour's wisdom,
"Fiiiiine, let's not set of that trap"

After making it to the path with the tracker and the box. After spotting and pointing out the next trap, Jake decided to be just a tiny bit snarky (bit clearly in good fun),
"So, I bet you don't want to set off THAT trap either."


He then looked to the trees above to see if there was an easy way to climb over where the tracker was detecting.  If not, he figured they could find a way around or crawl under its view.

"Preferably not," Seymour replied. He then began helping Jakey look for a good way to circumvent the trap.

Jake has little trouble climbing the tree. It's not easy, but you've made your way to second floor windows enough to manage. Once on a solid branch, you see you could make your way over the sensor pretty easily from here.

You also get a good look at a hidden net, right over the string you saw earlier. As well as a soldier sitting in a chair suspended on another tree. After looking at each other for a moment, he reaches for his belt, and tosses out a Pokémon right behind Seymour.

When Seymour caught sight of the red light of a pokeball out of the corner of his eye, he turned slowly to see a terrifying tree standing behind him. If it wasn't so close, it might have been really awesome to see. But as it was, Seymour was trembling as he grabbed a pokeball off his vest. "Falkner, did you set off a trap?" he asked even as Locke coalesced before him. Even in his fright, Seymour realized the tree was almost certainly a grass-type, and therefore vulnerable to fire. Not to mention Sunny had been keeping things sunny, further boosting the effectiveness of fire attacks.

If the tree made any sort of aggressive movements, Seymour wouldn't hesitate to order Locke to bathe it in flames.

The tree turns it's glowing eye to Locke, before roaring. The sound isn't very loud... but it resonates through your very soul, making you shiver.

The effect on Locke is more notable though, as green vines grow over his body. They don't look to be stopping him, but they look like they're almost digging into his skin...

Locke replies with his flames, but it does little to harm the creature.

Jake called back to Seymour,
"Man-trap! Its got eyes!"

Jake then decided to try to disable the solider, releasing fairy,
"Stringshot that dude, but try not to knock him out of the tree. He's not a baddy!"

With that order given, Jake then tried to make his way over to the box to nab it. Hopefully they could get the box and run without a prolonged engagement. That sort of thing felt right for this kinda challenge. Don't get bogged down and waste time.

"Hmm," Seymour mumbled. Was the fire not working, or did Locke just get in a bad hit? Regardless, Seymour decided to switch up his tactics. "Try hypnosis, Locke. Put it under your spell!" If he could get the tree to sleep, it could open up a lot of additional options for how to proceed from there.

Locke uses his hypnosis, but the tree resists. Instead, it sends a slender vine to strike the white rabbit. It looks small, and not too dangerous... but as it strikes, Locke shouts in pain. As you look at him, you notice the vines on him turning purple, as though poison was running through them.

As Jake sends out his Larfae on the branch, a second red beam, coming from a different tree, sends a Pokémon close to the box. A two-feet tall sunflower that seems to glow under Sunny's enhanced light.

Locke got hit by a Poison Jab, but wasn't Poisoned. However, it seems to affect him a lot more than it should.
Jake, do you want to change your order for Fairy, since there's a new opponent on the field?

"Nevermind!"
Jake called to Fairy,
"Bug bite that flower!"

Fairy wasn't his strongest pokemon, but he wanted to see if he could evolve it into the cool crystal butterfly he saw in the tournament so long ago. Still, it pained him to throw it into unfavorable situations. Jake hoped Fairy could hold on long enough for him to get down and swipe the box.

That's... concerning, Seymour thought to himself. He didn't know what exactly was going on, but he didn't want to keep subjecting Locke to such pain. He decided to try fighting fire with fire figuratively instead of literally. "Locke, return. Good try. Malley, you're up!" He sent the Ditto out to use the opponent's moves against them.

Fairy jumps down to attack, but ends up pretty much just nibbling the flower's leaf. It barely bothers the plant, that seems to glow under the sunlight... Nope, it really is glowing, and that glow turns into a powerful Solar Beam! Despite his glass body, the beam clearly hurt Fairy.

OOC: Malley now has the abilities Frisk (can reveal what nearby Pokémon are holding), Forest Lord (twice per fight, can use a grown tree nearby to attack), Leaf Guard (in Sunny weather, can cure one of it's status affliction)
His moves are now Forest Curse, Will-O-Wisp, Destiny Bound, Phantom Force, Poison Jab, and Feint Attack.

What do you want to do?

Jake groaned as Fairy did about as much as he expected. Nevertheless, he wasn't done with Fairy...types... so he switched out Fairy (the pokemon) with Tiefee (a fairy type pokemon).
"Ok, Feefee! Time for your first wild battle! Against a not-wild pokemon!  Use incinerate to show that flower what you can do!"

"Alright Malley, let's show this tree you are a force to be reckoned with. Use Phantom Force!" Even as he gave his directions, Seymour finally pulled out his Pokedex to gain some additional info on his foe. It seemed his assumptions about it's typings we're infact correct.

Trevenant, the Elder Tree Pokémon
Type: Ghost/Grass
People fear it due to a belief that it devours any who try to cut down trees in its forest, but to the Pokémon it shares its woods with, it's kind. Small roots that extend from the tips of this Pokémon's feet can tie into the trees of the forest and give Trevenant control over them.

As the Dex rattles off it's information, the two trees fade into the shadows. Moments after, they reappear, one striking the other... though you're not sure which is which.

Feefee prepares to attack, only to be hit by another beam of light. That sunflower is just firing non-stop, and your Tiefee just can't manage to get a hit in as he tries, unsuccessfully, to dodge the onslaught.

Seymour's eyes went wide as he realized he wasn't sure which of the ghost-trees was Malley anymore. But he didn't let that slow him down. Malley knew which pokemon Malley was. "Malley, use Feint Attack! Then follow it up with another Phantom Force!"

Jake groaned yet again. Maybe he should just let growler handle everything. Growler would have been a good matchup, and growler was awesome!  Then again, part of being a trainer was relying on a team -- not just his best.

"FeeFee, use minimize so it has a harder time hitting you! Then go in for a draining kiss!"

One of the tree strikes with a swift Feint attack, before both vanish in the shadows once more. When they reappear, one manage to land a major blow, knocking out it's opponent.

After waiting for a moment, both you and the soldier realize the knocked out Trevenant isn't turning back into a Ditto. Your win is confirmed as the ghost is recalled by it's trainer.

Meanwhile, FeeFee does a good job dodging a few more Solar Beam, but he can't seem to land a hit on the sun-powered flower. And with Sunny's enhanced sunlight still in play, the non-stop beams eventually manages to clip the diminutive fairy, knocking him out.

"Tauruscrap,"
Jake swore as he returned FeeFee.  He'd take its weaker fighting style into consideration. Anyway, time to blast this flower. Jake confidently released growlithe onto the battlefield,
"Yeah, you know what to do, make them roasty toasty with a flame-wheel."

Jake was confident Growler could take a hit or two from the beams as it attacked the plant.

"Yeah! Great job Malley!" Seymour looked around for Jakey. When he spotted the trainer's current location, he called out, "You need or want and help buddy?" If Jakey did want help, Seymour would have Malley use their Forest Lord ability to shake the tree Jakey's opponent was in. If not, he would wait patiently and watch Jakey's battle progress.

That was all assuming no other opponents emerged from the trees for Seymour himself.

The fight between Growler and the Sunflora looks more like something out of a cartoon than the usual Pokémon battle. Growler charges straight on, her body covered in flames as she forces her way through the beam of light. You're briefly blinded as energy spread in all direction. Once you manage to blink away the bright spot, you see the knocked out flower on the ground, with an injured, but proud, Growlithe standing over it.

You wait for a moment, but it seems the soldiers aren't planning on sending any other Pokémon after you.

OOC: Growler took 2 wounds from that fight.

Rather than call for help, Jake flashed a thumbs up to Seymour,
"Growler did their job. We are all good."

He then called to the trees,
"Are we? We all good?"

He wasn't sure if the gym members stuck around or not. But he wasn't planning on sticking around either. Returning Growler to their pokeball, Jake strutted over to the box they needed to complete the challenge. He doubted there were any traps left.  If everything was set up right, there should be a card inside to lead them to their next objective!

Seymour followed Jakey over to retrieve whatever was in the box. He also released Locke again, had Malley transform into the lapimage, then had Malley soothe Locke's wounds with some powder snow. He had purposefully brought along pokemon that could help keep eachother healthy in a pinch since this was a survival challenge, so he figured he should enact that strategy while he had the chance.

It wasn't until a while after the battle had ended that he realized something else. To Jakey, he said, "Oh. I just realized, it probably would have helped you if I had changed the weather, huh? Sorry. I was so caught up in my battle it hadn't occurred to me that a sunny battlefield might have been causing you problems. Think I should have Weatherman change the forecast? Otherwise Sunny can keep it Sunny for us. Actually, I should give Sunny a break regardless." He called down his leafy bird and switched out Sunny for Weatherman, then waited to hear what sort of forecast Jakey thought they should have.

The box is indeed not trapped, and inside it is a plastic card with a series of numbers. Entering them into the GPS tells you you need to head north to find your goal. In fact, looking through the trees, you can just see it poke out above the forest.

OOC: Quick level up:
Locke's speed increases to High
Malley's HP increase to Average

Fairy's Def increases to Low
FeeFee's speed increases to Ab. Av.
Growler's speed increases to Incred

Jake seemed more than pleased that they could see their destination.
"Not bad, not bad at all."

He was impressed by Seymour's creativity for putting a compatible team together. He wasn't sure if he had pokemon that synergized with each other so well. He hadn't thought much about the weather,
"Not sure if it would have made much of a difference. Maybe keep it sunny for now so we can spot any traps easier. Ya think we should cut through the forest or look for a trail?  I think cutting through actually wasn't too bad. We probably missed a lot of traps!  I am a bit worried we will be tracked by the tree people though."

"Let's try cutting through again. At least at first. We can always look for a trail again later if the wilderness gets too difficult." Seymour then had Weatherman float up above to keep the weather sunny for them, then picked a promising direction and began walking.

"I wouldn't worry too much about being tracked though. At least not by the people involved with the challenge. (Wild pokemon are another story.) I think it is pretty likely that they have designated posts." Of course it was just a guess, but if he was wrong then Seymour supposed he would just have to wallop them a second time.

You manage to push through the brushes easily enough, and reach the old, three-story high tower. It's base is half covered in clinging vines, and the door is ajar.

You keep looking over your shoulder in case the soldiers follow you, but you don't see any signs of them.

"Should we be suspicious? It feels like we should be suspicious." The trainer approached cautiously, keeping an eye out for any ambushes or traps. It especially seemed strange that the door was ajar. "This is the correct destination, right?"

"I think so but man, that is suspicious."

He wasn't sure if they just needed to get into the tower, or get to the top of it. In any case, he was expecting an ambush.

"Why don't we change the weather now, blast down the door from here, and then have bandy go investigate to suss out if there are tricksters waiting for us?"

Seymour nodded, agreeing with Jakey's plan. He released his Lombre and let it sit atop his shoulders, then said, "Weatherman? I think there is some rain in the forecast. Can you help us out?" As rain began to fall from the sky that was sunny moments before, Lombre's rain dish acted as a sort of umbrella for Seymour. He wouldn't stay completely dry, but he wouldn't get drenched either.

It wasn't until after the rain had already started to fall that he realized Malley could have been an umbrella-mon for Jakey as well. Oh well.
This message was last edited by the player at 19:56, Tue 29 Mar 2022.

As Weatherman turns into a raindrop, she hits the door with a Hydro Pump to open it for you. It only opens half-way, before getting stuck on something. But you don't have time to worry about that, as you see a small object fall in the door's opening.

With a sharp crack, the object explodes in a bright flash of light, leaving a big blind spot in your vision.

Jake was mostly unprepared for the flash-trap, but was able to get one eye covered in time. He had no idea what pokemon was about to emerge, but he had to act fast to keep the opponent busy while him and Seymour regained their vision properly,
"Skipper, go!"
Jake did his best to land Skipper right in the doorway,
"Use bide, so if it gives you a hard time, you give it an even harder one!"

Jake then pulled on Seymour's arm to try to get him to go to cover behind one of the nearby trees. There was an off-chance if the pokemon came out while they were in cover, they could distract it and sneak in.

"Ah!" yelled Seymour as his vision was blotted out by white spots. He had not expected that. He moved where Jakey pulled him, hoping he didn't trip or crash. "Captain Lombre, can you give us a bit of Mist cover in addition to this rain? We need to re-collect ourselves." The Lombre on Seymour's shoulders did their best to comply, although the pokemon was seeing stars as well.

As mist covers the area, you hear a loud snapping sound, as the door is pulled inside the tower. Between the flash and the mist, all you see coming out is a massive shadow, a seven feet tall lumbering mass, with a pair of almost glowing eyes staring at you.

The mass shudders, showering Skipper in a rain of rock, only for the Marshtomp to send them right back. To little effect, as the shambling mound barely seems to notice the attack.

Seymour wasn't quite sure what he was looking at yet, but in his mind he knew that the presence of a rock-rain attack meant that their new foe could very well be vulnerable to water attacks. And Seymour currently had a watery pokemon floating up above (as well as on his shoulders). Hopefully Weatherman could see the target well enough to aim an attack at the hulking figure. "Weatherman, Hydro Pump!"

In the meantime, Seymour tried using his Pokedex on the enemy pokemon. Hopefully the 'dex could tell him what his own eyes could not.

Jake had a similar idea, rock type move may mean rock type pokemon. But unfortunately, Skipper hadn't learned the perfect move for the job. Still, Jake hoped combined pressure from hydro pump and mud bomb would lay the other pokemon low,
"Mud bomb on it!"

After he gave his command, he pulled out the pokedex to try to identify their giant foe.

A long limp shoots out of the mass, trying to strike Weatherman. The sprite avoids the blow, replying with a strong stream of water that leaver her gasping. Moments after the Hydro Pump dies down, Skipper's ball of wet dirt explodes on the creature.

And as you watch, two long limbs shoot out again, pulling the creature to the top of the small tower. Now that it's above the mist, you get a better look at it... or as good a look as you can get, when all you see is a mass of blue tentacles.

Tangrowth, the Vine pokemon.
Type: Grass

Tangrowth has two arms that it can extend as it pleases. Recent research has shown that these arms are, in fact, bundles of vines. Its vines grow so profusely that, in the warm season, you can't even see its eyes.

OOC: Weatherman has managed to exhaust her Hydro Pump, disabling the attack.
This message was last edited by the GM at 17:46, Fri 01 Apr 2022.

"A grass type?" said Seymour, surprised. But his surprise quickly shifted to a grin. "No problem. Weatherman, a Snow Warning is now in effect. Powder that pokemon with icy snow!"

---

Cast form will use its Snow Warning ability, followed by a Powder Snow attack.

Grass was a good match-up against quite a few of his pokemon, but skipper was definitely not one of them. Jake quickly retracted skipper and threw in Fairy,
"Redemption time!  Bug-bite it!"

He felt a bit bad throwing out an inferior pokemon and making the challenge last longer, but he figured they were right at the end, so he wanted to get his weaker pokemon some combat practice rather than just relying on Growler, Skipper, and Fetcher till the end of time.

OOC: Fairy has one wound, I think

The rain turns solid, and Weatherman changes form again as it blows snow on the massive pokemon. The Tangrowth tries to reply by throwing more rocks at Weatherman, but she easily dodges the attack. While it's distracted, Fairy climbs up the side of the tower to attack... only to find the Tangrowth doesn't even notice the munching on it's tentacles. And when your bug tries to find it's way past them, he ends up tickling the pokemon, making it shake about and release a cloud of pollen.

OOC: Fairy does have a wound. And now he's been hit by a Stun Spore, paralyzing him. The Tangrowth doesn't seem to be injured so far.

"Weatherman, try Powder Snow again, but aim for the feet!" He figured that with the tower having recently been slicked with rain, aiming an ice attack at the Tangrowth's feet could either improve the chance to freeze it to that surface, or maybe make the tower slippery and cause the opposing pokemon to slide off the tower. He just hoped poor Fairy wouldn't get caught in the crossfire.

"Keep up the good work, Fairy!" Jake called, trying to inspire self-confidence in the little bug. He then turned to Seymour,
"Don't worry, we got this now."

He flashed the card, then bolted towards the door of the tower. The rules never said they needed to KO all the opposing pokemon, they just needed to scan the card in the tower. Now that the tangrowth was atop the tower and distracted by a couple pokemon, Jake figured he could end the challenge early!

Weatherman dodges a swipe to get close, before freezing the Tangrowth's vine in place. It left her open for a blow, but your living weather system doesn't seem badly hurt from it. Meanwhile, Fairy keeps digging through the vine, trying to find something he can bite...

Jake stumbles into the tower, and pauses at the scene. The place is covered in dirt and plant, and it doesn't look like any human entered this place in years. You look for a key-card reader, but there doesn't seem to be any. And even if there was one, you're not sure there's any power in this place to make it work...

"What the crap???" Jake swore loud enough for Seymour to hear as he was unable to find any sign of what they were looking for. They said it was an old base, this one looked... well, too old.  And they still hadn't taken care of the tangrowth.  To help that process along, Jake released Fetcher as he thought of where they went wrong,
"Use aerial ace or something!"

Seymour wasn't sure what Jakey's plan was when he disappeared, but it sounded like it hadn't panned out. He didn't have time to inquire about it though. A battle was still raging.

"Weatherman! Use Powder Snow again! But be ready for a Tackle if I give the word." Seymour was hoping the Tangrowth would freeze solid, but if it happened to free its vines from the roof, Seymour wanted Weatherman to tackle it at that exact moment while it would have precarious balance on the slippery roof.

Between the frozen vines, and the bird now harassing it, the Tangrowth seems to grow worried. It starts to rip off part of the tower, tossing it toward Weatherman, and trying to free itself. Instead, it just gives itself a weaker foothold.

Before Seymour can order a tackle, Weatherman covers the plant in ice, while Fletcher tips it over. Jake just manages to jump out of the way before three hundred pounds of plant matter crashes where he stood, unconscious.

Then... something starts to glow under the vines. You hold your breath for a moment... only to see a large piece of ice growing between the vines. A piece of glistening ice that turns to look at you.


OOC: Level up!
Weatherman's Def increases to Except

Fetcher learns Air Cutter
Air Cutter Flying S Average -1 Target all nearby foes

And Fairy has evolved into Crystalid!
His Def increases to Below Average, his SpD increases to Average, and he learns Harden Normal * +1 Def

"We won!" Seymour cheered. "And Fairy evolved! Amazing!" He turned to his Castform and said, "You did spectacularly, Weatherman. Can you make it sunny for us again? Then you deserve a good rest." Once the hail disappeared and the sun began to shine, Seymour returned the Castform to its pokeball.

"What did you find in the tower, Falkner? Anything good?"

Jake was enthused enough about the victory to express that rather than disappointment from their lack of findings,
"Wooo! Fairy evolved! We did great!"

He then did his best to nuzzle the head of the new pokemon with his own head, before returning it and adopting a more serious expression as he relayed his findings,
"I think this is the wrong place, but the card led us here, so I really have no idea what is going on. It looks way too abandoned."

He then offered the card to Seymour,
"Maybe I did it in my pokedex wrong to find the place. Maybe we poke around here a bit. I want to see if I can climb the tower to get a better view"

Jake then turned to look at the small tower. He had scaled buildings before, so he looked for a route up that looked feasible.

"The wrong place?" Seymour asked, confused. He double-checked their coordinates.

Regardless of whether their coordinates were accurate or not, Seymour then headed into the tower to help look for clues.

Looking at the coordinates, you see that... you're still a good distance away from your destination. It seems that you're not at the right tower. And there's not much inside, besides the half-eaten berries the Tangrowth feeds on.

Considering how to go on, you see there's a river blocking your path to the north. That leaves you four options to keep going:
You see a rather obvious (but rickety) bridge crossing the river.
Looking more closely, you also see a broken tree a bit further to the east that you could cross on, though it looks rather slippery.
You could make your way up a rather steep hill to the east, to get a better look over the area.
You could head west, through a rather thick forest. It wouldn't get you closer to your target, but you see some berries in the area.

"Aw, phewy, I thought we were already done."

Jake didn't have much of an opinion about where to go next,
"Well, looks like there is some water ahead. I don't really trust anything set up for us to cross, but we gotta cross. Maybe we can think about getting wet? Or break down another tree to get us across?"

Skipper should be able to help them swim across without an issue, but he wasn't sure if the current was really strong. He had some experience swimming in the ocean, but less in a river.

"I do have my wetsuit, so I'm not worried about getting wet," Seymour commented. He considered the situation and Jakey's preferences. "I am fine with looking for our own way to cross. In that case, let's head toward those berries over there. Might as well collect some while we search for another good spot to cross." A place with some stepping stones would be good. Or a particularly slow section of the river. Maybe a Bibarel dam?

Jake wasn't sure what a bibarel dam was, but getting some berries to freshen up his injured pokemon didn't sound bad,
"Yeah, lets do that."

Jake then released Growler so both it and Fairy could eat their fill of berries. Too bad Feefee had been KO'd otherwise it may be able to grab a snack as well.

Going through the brushes slows down your progress, but your pokémon find some nice berries along the way, putting more pep in their steps.

After walking for an hour, you notice the river is digging a small ravine, before turning into a swamp at the bottom of a cliff. You're pretty sure you could make your way down somewhat easily, after your previous experience, and you could make your way across the swamp, if you don't mind getting dirty. You could also try jumping over the small ravine to cross the river.

On the other hand... you cross a patch of even thicker brambles that reaches over the river. You could use it as a shortcut, if you don't mind getting scratches.


OOC: The berries are good enough for your pokémon to heal their wounds, though Feefee is still KO.

"What are your thoughts Falkner? I am thinking we should either try jumping, or risk the brambles. You have any pokemon with you that can make rope?" If they could secure themselves before jumping, Seymour would feel a lot better making such a risk since he was not exceptionally athletic. Hopefully their flying pokemon could also help extend their jump range, and their water pokemon could assist if they fell in. Regardless, Seymour began changing into his wetsuit.

Jake only had to take one look at the swamp to rule that out,
"Yeah, we can jump. Well, I can jump it for sure."
Jake beat his chest proudly at his athleticism.

"I don't know about rope pokemon, but Fetcher can probably help give you a lift it you don't think you can make it."

He released Fetcher, then began stretching his legs in anticipation of making the jump unassisted. He was tempted to make the jump immediately, but instead waited for Seymour to get prepared.

Jake takes a running leap, and easily crosses the gap. As Fetcher stays ready to help, Seymour does the same, making it across with an entire inch to spare!

While you relax from the adrenaline rush, you hear a quack of surprise from Fetcher. To your surprise, you see the bird get pelted by a stream of large seeds coming from the ravine.

"Come on!" Jake exclaimed as he saw the bird getting stuck after hearing its squawk. He wasn't sure what exactly was happening, so he decided to go on the defensive, pulling fetcher back into its pokeball and making for the cover of the tree-line so he could observe if any pokemon was about to emerge from the ravine from a safe vantage.

Seymour followed suit, withdrawing his pokemon and hiding next to Jakey. Whispering, he asked, "What do you think it is? A grass type, probably. And at this location, likely wild too." He had his Pokedex ready to scan it.

Moments after Fetcher is recalled, a four-legged pokémon jumps out of the ravine.

Gogoat, the Mount Pokémon.
Type: Grass
They inhabit mountainous regions. The leader of the herd is decided by a battle of clashing horns.

The Gogoat snorts as it looks around, looking ready to charge at anything that moves.

"Neat! A Gogoat!" whispered Seymour. "Should we try to catch it? Could be useful the next time we are in the mountains, plus it looks so nice!" Perhaps that was an odd way to describe a pokemon ready to charge at the drop of a hat.

Jake didn't have much a need for a goat of any kind,
"Go for it. We got plenty of sun, and it would be one way to keep it from following us and making trouble."

Despite keeping your voice down, the goat turns toward your bushes, snarling angrily.

Seymour grinned at Jakey, then sent out a pokemon to battle the Gogoat. "Locke, you're up. Trap it in a Fire spin, then use Hypnosis!" If he managed to get the pokemon to sleep, he would toss a PokeBall.

Locke moves swiftly, not only trapping the goat in moments, but also putting it to sleep before it can attack.

You toss your pokéballs... but it's not easy to aim at your target through the flames. You end up throwing a lot of balls at the Gogoat...

OOC: Catching the Gogoat means you need to drop your pokéballs to Low. Do you want to do that?

After the first few pokeballs he threw, Seymour was beginning to see the downfall of choosing a Fire Spin attack on a pokemon he wanted to catch. Even so, he wasn't about to let the injured Gogoat to keep laying there, injured. He threw pokeballs until he captured it, thoroughly depleting his pokeball supply in the process.

"Maybe that wasn't the smartest choice, but I caught it," he commented to Jakey. "And now we can continue on without worrying about it butting out butts. Great job Locke." He returned the Lapimage to its pokeball.

---

I will drop my Pokeballs to Low and catch the Gogoat.

"Nice!" Jake commented. The initial engagement was diluted by the anticlimatic continual throwing of pokeballs. He then looked about. They had gotten across the ravine without too much issue, but he got distracted by the goat that he felt the need take their bearings again,
"So, just head through the woods towards the target some more?"

"Essentially, yeah, I guess." Seymour shrugged. He then reoriented and checked their coordinates, then began continuing the trek toward their destination. He hoped they would be relatively safe from traps since they had chosen a non-obvious path, but new that the closer they got to their destination, the more likely they would be to still run into something.

You struggle through the brushes for a while, until you find a small path that seems to lead in the right direction. It seems rather obvious, so it's probably trapped. Unfortunately, the only alternative you can see is what looks like a hidden den, with traces of what looks like a large snake going into it.

"I'm not sure I want to head into a tunnel full of snakes right now," Seymour commented. "Should we stick to the path and keep an eye out for traps?"

Despite his words, Seymour paused and did a double take at the snake den. "Unless... the snake inside might be one of those crystal Onix we heard about..." He looked to see if it was even remotely likely that the den might belong to an Onix.

Jake didn't like the idea of following the path. He also didn't like the idea of keeping going through the brush. And, he didn't like the idea of tromping through a snake den.  Still, a choice had to be made.

"Well, if it isn't a crystal onix, I'm not interested in messin' with snakes. We can try the path... and keep an eye out."

It's hard to tell for certain, but seems too smooth for the usually jagged form of an Onix.

As you walk along the small path, Jake pauses as he notices a small rock in the middle of the trail. Just sitting there. It seems perfectly normal... except that it's the only rock sitting like that. And looking closely, you see the dirt around it seemed to have been disturbed.

As Jake approached the rock, he became increasingly suspicious. With his suspicion peaking as he noticed the disturbed dirt around the rock. Tapping Seymour on the shoulder, he pointed to the rock with his other hand,
"That rock looks suspicious to me. Only thing is, should we mess with it or like, avoid it. I kinda want to have bandy smash it with her big hammer."

As he talked, his hand was already moving toward's Bandy's pokeball. Apparently Jake REALLY wanted to see Bandy pulverize the poor rock. Seymour would have a chance to raise an objection before Jake could release bandy and give her the order though.

"Well... I mean, this challenge is all about avoiding traps, isn't it?" Seymour lifted his shoulders and put his palms up in a questioning gesture, then lowered them again in minor defeat. "But you know what? I'm not your mother. If you want to deal with the consequences, go right ahead and mess with the rock. Just let me get out of range of the consequences myself first." Seymour hustled back the way they had come until he felt he was a safe distance away, then gave Jakey the thumbs-up of approval.

Jake wasn't sure what kind of the trap the rock was -- if any.
"Bandy is quick enough to deal with a lot. And hitting it hard enough may break it totally. Like if it were a string trap, I'd totally not want to smash it up, but this one... I think a smash is the right call."

Despite this, Jake also kept a safe distance from the rock as he released bandy and commanded her to pulverize the suspicious rock.

Bandy takes her best croquet stance, and bats away the rock. It flies away... and the item it was holding down jumps into the air.

It makes a sharp crack before falling to the ground, and you see Bandy fall over, sleeping.

That was not what Jake was expecting, but it was better than the worst-case scenario. He had thought there might be a pokemon hiding in ambush under the rock. Turning to Seymour, he ate murkrow,
"Ok, I was wrong on this one. Next trap I won't try to get clever on!"

He didn't seem to mind too much that Bandy had fallen asleep, he simply retracted her into her pokeball and started again down the path. He didn't think having one pokemon asleep would make the rest of the challenge impossible (or even that difficult!).

"Of all the status effects that trap could have inflicted, Sleep is a pretty mild one. I'm just glad we didn't all get caught in the blast. The path does not look like a comfy spot to take a nap." He walked next to Jakey as they continued down the path, keeping an eye out for any more suspicious rocks or other hazards. He also checked his GPS every so often to make sure they were still headed toward the correct coordinates.

Looking at the GSP, you see you're making good progress, even catching a glimpse of another tower between the trees. But when you look ahead, you notice strange lights on the forest's floor. A very faint glow you wouldn't have notice, were it not that the sun is starting to set, and the forest is growing dark.

Perhaps if Bandy weren't asleep Jake's instinct would be to smash to suspicious colors on the ground, but nobody will ever know,
"Last time I got the call wrong, so I'll let you handle this. Maybe it is a pokemon? Maybe it is a trap? Maybe it is a trap pokemon?"

Seymour rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "Hmm. Let's see. What are we dealing with here?" Seymour examined the faint glow carefully but cautiously. He looked to see if it was forming any sort of path or pattern. Maybe it would show them the safe path to their destination. Or perhaps mark the location of traps. Or maybe even it was simply a part of the local wild landscape. He did his best to judge the faint light's purpose.

Moving closer, it seems the light comes from bio-luminescent mushrooms. Mushrooms who briefly shakes, sending out a cloud of spores...

Seymour tried to stay back far enough to avoid any spores, but eyed the mushrooms suspiciously. "Hmm. Curious." On a whim, the trainer pulled out a pokeball and tossed it at a mushroom to see what would happen.

---

Seymour is testing to see if these mushrooms are anything catchable.

The mushroom glows red as it touches the pokeball, before vanishing inside. Even as the ball shakes, the other mushroom starts to move toward you, revealing black eyes under their mushroom cap.

OOC: Seymour managed to avoid the first cloud, but he's now surrounded by half-a-dozen Morellul! What do you do?

"Well, the mushrooms are pokemon," said Seymour. He hadn't expected his experiment to result in getting himself surrounded though, so he was a bit caught off-guard. "I guess if they are trying to go six on one, then six on six is more than fair, right?"

Without waiting for an answer, Seymour threw all six of his team's pokeballs into the air, releasing the pokemon within. "Malley, be Locke. Locke, Malley, Weatherman, use Powder Snow. Captain Lombre, Sunny, Corium, use Tackle. Everyone pick a different target." Seymour figured this would either end in a decisive victory or a complete disaster.

Jake took a step back and waited to see what would happen. But he had a hand on Fetcher's pokeball in case Seymour suddenly needed backup.

Your team jumps out, eager to strike out against your opponents. Weatherman manages to knockout her target right away, while most of the others land some form of telling blow. But as they hit the small mushroom, more and more spores are scattered around the area, and you see your team fall asleep one after the other.

And as Jake watches from a safe distance, Seymour passes out as well.

OOC: I was very lucky with the Sleep Powder...

Jake went from cheering for his friend to suppressing a laugh. He wasn't sure what the opposing pokemon would do to his sleeping pal, but he wasn't TOO concerned. That being said, Jake wasn't about to stand back and let it happen. He adopted the same approach as Seymour by releasing several pokemon, but with an alteration.
"Growler, Fetcher, Fairy! Let's go!"

As they emerged from their pokeballs, he gave orders,
"Growler, Flame wheel!"
"Fetcher, stay back and blast one with aerial ace!"
"Fairy, uh, bug-bite! try to eat your way to evolution again!"

Jake then released the sleeping bandy as well. Why not? Maybe she would wake up in time to contribute. Skipper was staying it its pokeball though, Jake knew enough to know its typing was abysmal in this situation.

With his cheek in the dirt, Seymour promptly began snoring. And drooling. And twitching one leg like a Rockruff dreaming about chasing Littens.

As Jake's pokémons enter the battle, you notice the injured mushroom are draining some form of light from Seymour's sleeping pokémons, causing their wounds to fade. Growler re-hurts one of them, while Fetcher knocks out another one before it can heal. Fairy tries the same... but just distracts it enough that it fails to heal.

Weatherman briefly wakes up, and tries to freeze the nearest foe, only for more spores to return her to sleep. Meanwhile, one of the Morelull tries to hit Fetcher with a phantom light... that does nothing to the bird. Growler's opponent also gets hit by a ghostly beam, confusing her.

"ZZZzzzzz... No Mom, I don't want to ride the Ponyta... zzzzZZZZ"

Jake confidently followed-up his orders with more orders,
"Great work, keep doing what you are doing! Growler, switch targets!"

He wasn't too concerned about Fairy's failed attempts. Fairy would improve over time. He did take a moment to chuck a pokeball at Growler's former target. While he wasn't a particular fan of the mushroom pokemon, in this case, catching it would remove a combatant.

The pokeball captures Growler's target, but the canine is just stumbling around in confusion until the mushroom puts him to sleep. Fetcher strikes his foe, before being hit by another ghostly beam. And despite Fairy's difficulties, he manages to get a painful bite in, forcing the mushroom to drain Growler's dream to heal itself.

Just as Growler passes out, Bandy wakes up, looking around confused. Almost as confused is Seymour, who also wakes up in the middle of a confusing melee. While surrounded by his sleeping pokemon.

Seymour wrinkled his brow as he woke up on the ground, surrounded by his pokemon and a bunch of mushroom-mons. "... What?" Then Seymour sat bolt upright, then scrambled back away from the enemy pokemon as best he could, pulling Corium with him. They must have put his entire team asleep and he didn't want the same thing to happen again.

"Buddies, return!" His pokemon probably wouldn't wake up inside their pokeballs, but they wouldn't be subjected to enemy attacks either. Hopefully Corium would wake up soon though and be able to help.

---

Returning all my pokemon except my Shedinja, because it is the lightest to carry.

"Dang, can't let us wake up normally; they'll just keep messing with us when we sleep."
Jake retracted growler into its pokeball. He ignored fairy who was doing its best and focused on Fetcher and Bandy,
"Fetcher, let's try to scatter them with air cutter!"
"Bandy, start pounding!"

Seymour moves away with Corrium, recalling Weatherman at the same time. Before he can recall more, both Corrium and Malley wake up, trying to figure out what's happening.

Brandy lands a solid blow on her opponent, while Fairy is hit by another Confuse Ray. Meanwhile, Fetcher fires off his Air Cutter, doing more damage to the trees and plants than to his target. But as the bushes are cut, another, larger mushroom is revealed...

With two of his pokemon now awake, Seymour switched strategies again. "Corium, use Leech Life. Malley, be Locke again and use Powder Snow. Our friends need our help while they wake up!" The trainer left his other pokemon out to let them wake up if possible, and also directed his Pokedex toward the newly revealed peeping pokemon.

"Fetcher, Ace that fairy circle king!"

Jake let his other pokemon continue without additional orders as he shifted his attention to what he viewed was the largest threat on the field.

Fetcher switches his focus to the larger mushroom, though it seems even tougher than the small ones. Malley lends it's help, though it's cold attack is also unable to injure the glowing pokemon. It does, however, manage to hurt the two smaller pokemon next to it. One, after Fairy lets go of it due to his confusion, manages to heal some of it's wound by draining Captain Lombre. The other, Fetcher's former target, is struck by Corium's bite, knocking it out.

Bandy manages to land another solid blow, before being hit by one more Confuse Ray, leading her to spin her hammer until she smashes into a tree. Still, she's in better shape than Fairy, who managed to knock himself out. Corrium tries to avenge him, and does get a good bite in, but it stumbled too close to the large mushroom, and more Spores puts him back to sleep, even as Seymour recovers both Captain Lombre and Locke.

OOC: To recap, you have two Morelull remaining, both badly injured, and one Shiinotic, still unharmed.

Fairy is KO, while Bandy and Fetcher both have a wound, and are confused.

Malley is still doing well in Locke's form, and Corrium is the only other of Seymour's pokemon out, though currently asleep.

Jake was running dangerously low on capable pokemon. He pulled back both his confused pokemon, leaving him with just Skipper ready for combat. Flicking out its pokeball, he called out the orders,
"Try to get 'em all with a rockslide, and be careful!"

Jake had considered leaving Seymour to fend for himself, but he didn't want to appear like he wasn't contributing.

"Malley, let's make that a hot rock slide. Use Ember!" The battle overall was not going so swell, but Seymour was still hopeful they could win. He kept Corium out of its pokeball in case it woke up again to help.

---

Malley is helping Skipper by using Ember, but is focusing more on the little Morelulls.

Skipper throws out a wave of stones, that Malley swiftly eats up with his Embers. The Shiinotic, who has yet to move from the spot you first saw it, gets caught right in the middle, getting it's first notable wound. And the Morelulls, who had regrouped near their 'leader', get buried and knocked out by the combined attack.

The Shiinotic, still standing in place, replies with a Moonblast, injuring Malley. And waking Corium again.

"We've got this, guys! Malley, use another Ember. Right at its face this time. Corium, use your Confuse Ray!" With only one foe remaining, it looked like they would be able to drag themselves to a victory. Hopefully...

"Great job Skipper! Now get back and use foresight!"

Jake didn't want to completely abandon the field to Seymour to finish the pokemon alone, but he also wanted to get Skipper out from a really really bad matchup.  He had skipper's pokeball in hand so if the freaky shroom even looked at Skipper a funny way, he could pull it back to safety.

Corium's beam does it's work, confusing the mushroom. Unfortunately, it also seems exceptionally resistant to Locke's attack, the fire failing to take hold on the Shiinotic.

"That's odd..." muttered Seymour when the fire attack seemed ineffective. But he quickly switched back to using ice attacks instead. "Malley, try Powder Snow again. Corium, knock it out with your Fury Swipes!"

Now that Skipper had prepared with foresight, Jake wasn't sure what to do. It looked like Seymour was still in control of the fight, but if Seymour's roster was as beat-up as Jake's taking a risk to finish the opponent off early may be worth the risk.

Jake readied his pokeball as he gave Skipper the order,
"When corium is out of the way, rock-slide that shroom!"

Once the move was executed, Jake would immediately pull Skipper back into its pokeball and shoot Seymour an apologetic look.

Switching element did the trick, as Locke freezes the mushroom and the ground around it, stopping it's attempt to draw nutrients from the ground for a moment. Skipper's rock-slide didn't do much damage, but it did distract the Shiinotic long enough for Corium to float down and sink their fangs into the plant, knocking it out.

OOC: Sending out your new pokemon stats soon.

When the battle was finally over, Seymour breathed a huge sigh of relief and leaned heavily against a tree. "That could have certainly gone better," he commented to Jakey. He then checked their coordinates to see how much further they still had to go.

"Should we try to wake up some pokemon before we continue?" Even as he asked the question, Seymour was releasing his sleeping pokemon from their pokeballs to see if any were feeling any more awake.

Jake didn't have sleeping pokemon, but he had confused ones! One by one, he took out their pokeball and worked to get the pokemon calmed down. As he did so, he couldn't resist prodding Seymour a bit,
"Looks like we both screw up with these traps. I hope we are close"

//Looks like

(In Team)
Fetcher: Farfech'd (1 wound)
Skipper: Marshtomp (0 wound)
Growler: Growlithe (KO)
Bandy: Bandicoon (1 wound)
Tiefee: FeeFee:  (KO)
Fairy: Larfae (KO)

Checking the coordinates, you realize the tower you see between the branches is actually the tower you're looking for! A good thing, as the sun has disappeared beyond the horizon.

OOC: Pokemon level up time!

Feefee's HP increases to Above Average
Growler's Att increases to Awesome
Fairy's SpD increases to Above Average
Bandy's SpD increases to Above Average
Fetcher's HP increases to Average

Malley's Att increases to Average
Locke's Speed increases to Exceptional
Sunny's Att increases to Above Average
Cpt Lombre's HP increases to Average, and he learns Fury Swipes
Fury Swipes    Normal   P   Weak   -2   Gets +1 Power per 5 of hits margin, max +5
Corrium learns the move Grudge
Grudge         Ghost    *               If user is KO'd by a foe's attack, that attack is Disabled for the day
Weatherman learns the move Weather Ball
Weather Ball   Normal   S   Average    0   During Weather effect, change type and gain +2 Pow

"Oh thank goodness. We are almost there," said Seymour with a lot of relief in his voice. He took a few steps toward the tower, then recalled what Jakey had just said and paused. They really were screwing up with the traps lately. And there were likely more between where they stood and where the tower towered.

"I guess we should still take it slow though. Unless we want to trigger another trap. Malley, light the way as a Lapimage. Corium, ghost around and see if you can spot anything us more-solid people might trigger. I'll keep an eye out the best I can too. Nobody touch any more mushrooms..."

You move carefully, guided by Malley's light, and make it to the door without issue. It's closed tight. Next to it is a black panel with a single red light.

Passing the key card over it turns the light green, and the door unlocks. Despite the rundown look of the tower on the outside, the inside is clean and furnished. You find a small kitchenette with plenty of food, a well-stocked infirmary, and a bedroom with three double bunk beds.

While Jake's body still had energy, his mind was exhausted. As soon as the door opened to reveal the polished interior, he muttered,
"Finally"

He then proceeded to rummage through the kitchenette looking for snacks before flopping on one of the bunk beds for a bit. He expected to have the night to use the infirmary to help his pokemon recover.
"I wish there was just one big city stretching across the world so I wouldn't need to ever go into the wilderness again!"

Seymour felt much the opposite of Jakey. His mind was still just fine, but his body was physically exhausted. He found a good spot for all of his pokemon to rest outside their pokeballs so that he could monitor their progress, then he slumped into a chair and gnawed on some snacks before bedtime.

"I think that was the most challenging gym yet," he commented. "I am extremely glad we didn't run into more of the traps. The few we came across were bad enough. But hey, we made it!" Even so, Seymour wasn't sure he would be able to rest completely until he had his badge in hand. He felt like there might be a 1% chance this tower was yet another elaborate trap for the challenge.

Using the supplies in the infirmary, you manage to heal up all your pokemons, before cooking yourselves a nice meal before heading to bed.

OOC: Oops, it seems I skipped Skipper.

Skipper can pick one of the following abilities:

Damp (pokemons cannot use Explosion, Self-Destruct, or Aftermath when user is in range)
Mud Dweller (user is one step resistant to Water and Ground moves)

The next morning, after a light breakfast, you hear the tower's door open. "Goood morning trainers! I see you made it through in one piece!" Lieutenant Hughe says as she enters, the smell of a Repel accompanying her.

"More or less," Seymour replied. "This gym challenge is probably the toughest one I have face yet. Did we complete it satisfactorily, Lieutenant Hughe?" Seymour stood mostly at attention, but his body was aching enough that he wasn't quite a rigid as he otherwise would have been.

"You have! You've done a great job avoiding most of our traps, and defeating the Shiinotic guarding the tower. Do you feel ready to get back to town? I'll escort you there so you don't have to worry about stumbling into more of our tricks."

"I certainly wouldn't mind an escort back to town," admitted Seymour. He looked to Jakey to see if he agreed. But the paranoid part of Seymour's mind also added, "As long as it's not one last trap designed to get us to leave before receiving our badges."

"We scanned the card, so they can't trick us anymore" Jake reminded Seymour. If there were any more tricks, Jake would ask to talk to their manager! He indicated he was ready to follow and looked much more relaxed than Seymour.

"I forgot, was this ranked as one of the harder gym badges, Seymour was totally right, this was the hardest one by far. That Shiinotic with all of its pals were vicious!"

"Indeed, you just defeated a rank 3 challenge! We're proud to be on par with Montaunin's mountain challenge, Northlone's arctic challenge, and Carcamiers's artillery challenge."The Lieutenant nods, and leads you through one of the smaller trails. At a few point, you notice her slowing down. In one of those occasion, you spot a discreet box tied to a tree, almost invisible other than the blinking green light that appeared as Lieutenant Hughe gets closer.

"The Shiinotic is a bit of a special guardian. We trained him to not only fight independently, but also managed to get him to lead the Murelull around the area. It's always a good challenge, dealing with a group of pokemon specialized in disabling the opposition."

"Oh yeah. They were incredibly effective against me. Me and my pokemon were put to sleep immediately. Luckily Falkner was there to watch my back." He gave Jakey an appreciative nod.

As they walked, Seymour watched with interest at how the various traps on the trail were hidden and what effects they were intended to have. He realized just how much effort it must have taken to set up. "How often do your own people end up in traps they forgot about?" he asked out of curiosity.

"Oh, there's always one or two a week. Almost always recruits." Hughe says. "It's part of the training, after all. A good ranger needs to not only know how to place traps, but how to find and avoid them. That's why only the higher officers are given a list of the traps, or the 'escort protection' you're given today."

Without the threat of traps and with someone knowing the fastest path, you find the trip back to town much faster than expected. In fact, you're back in time for dinner. "Now, how about a light dinner before we see the Brigadier General?"

"Makes sense. I can't imagine artillery challenge would be that hard. Just point and shoot, right?"

Jake wasn't surprised some soldiers get caught in their own traps,
"Yeah, I can't imagine one person sets all this up. And I bet some soldiers like to move the traps a bit to prank others! It sounds like a fun place to be posted. Well, except for all the nature."

As they get back, his stomach was enthusiastic on the prospect of food. It had been a while since a proper meal, and he figured the military would be paying for the dinner,
"Yeah, lets have it!"

"A good meal sounds wonderful," admitted Seymour. His stomach began rumbling loudly at the mere thought of tasty food. It had been a long walk.

"Good! I know a nice restaurant selling locally hunted venison." She leads you to small restaurant bathed in the smell of smoking meat. It's tougher meat than you're used too, but it's an interesting taste.

After the meal, you're lead back to the base, and toward a small hall in the main building. The walls are decorated by paintings of various battlefield, all featuring the ground troupes front and center. At the end, half-a-dozen soldiers wait at attention. Lieutenant Hughe salutes the most decorated one of the group. "Brigadier General Dean Mckinley, I present to you the newest challenger. Seymour, and Falkner." She takes her place at the end of the line of soldier.

"Welcome, challengers. And congratulation on winning our challenge!" He steps forward, and hands you your new badge. "You can now proudly tell those you met that you traveled through the training ground of the great Cadien Rangers..." He then launches into a long retelling of the Ranger's history, making you very glad that you had dinner...


OOC: Congratulation! You get to increase one of your stats by one, and can pick one of those new Strength:
 - Trap Finder (+1 to Intuition checks to spot traps)
 - Finder's Keepers! (Gain the Pick Up pokemon ability, giving you a small chance to find an item after each fight)
 - Somnophibia (+2 to resist falling asleep, and to wake up)

Also, I kinda had to dig deep for a badge image...

This message was last edited by the GM at 17:56, Sun 29 May 2022.

Seymour listened with interest to Dean's history lesson, but even he was beginning to get bored by the end. Still, it was a small price to pay for victory.

When he and Jakey were finally allowed to go their own way again, Seymour asked his friend, "What should we do now that we have our first tier 3 badge? Where should we head next? Or should we ask Phoebe where she and her Dodrio would like to go?"

Jake wasn't sure how to feel about eating venison. He didn't know what it was but it tasted OK... He was thankful to have a meal on the house though. Overall, Argenvers was an interesting town, he was glad to have visited, but he kinda wanted to visit a real town again. He did his best to be a gracious guest at the ceremony, but he grew visibly bored before the end.  He perked up when they were released,
"Yeah, I hope she didn't get into too much trouble when we were getting lost!  I want to go to a place that doesn't look like a fairy tale soon though. It just feels a bit weird here. Where is the next closest tier 3 badge?"

Looking at the map, you figure the nearest rank 3 gym would be Carcamier, the artillery challenge. Passing by the road (which would be faster than cutting through the forest, especially with all the traps around...) would take about five days. It would also take you through Vinmur, a rank 1 gym.

When you get back to the hotel, you spot Phoebe sitting on a bench outside. She's hugging her knees, looking at a couple walking with their daughter, laughing as the girl runs next to them.
This message was last edited by the GM at 14:50, Wed 01 June 2022.

"You doing okay, Phoebe? Anything interesting happen while we were gone?" asked Seymour as they approached. He didn't say aloud that he and Jakey and succeeded at the gym challenge, but he did hold his vest open to show the shiny new badge located there. He wanted to let her know the outcome of their challenge without bragging about it in the process.

Phoebe looks up at Seymour. "Oh, I'm fine. Nothing big happened, but the TV said there was a storm coming in, so I though I'd get some air before it got here." She jumps to her feet, not noticing your new badges.

"Storm? Oh man, when will it be here? Will we be able to get to Vinmur before it hits? I don't like walking in the wilderness, and double so if it is raining Delcatties and Growlithes!"

Unlike Seymour, he didn't feel shy about bragging about their new badges,
"Have you decided to come with yet? You'd be traveling with two trainers who have a tier 3 badge! That is the best there is! We catch more pokemon we know what to do with. Back in the day, I felt invisible, but now people actually see me now. Well, when I want them too."

Jake flashed a grin. He'd lived Phoebe's lifestyle before. The worst part for him was how most people acted like he didn't exist... unless he was doing something wrong. Now he was a quasi-celebrity. Even if his past didn't command respect, the badges on his shirt sure did!

Seymour was also interested in the storm's details. They had Weatherman or Sunny to help with a bit of poor weather here and there, but it wasn't fair to expect them to negate the effects of an entire storm!

To Phoebe he said, "Rain or shine, you are still more than welcome to join us."

Phoebe thinks for a moment, before saying. "Why not. It be nice to see some other places for a while. But isn't Vinmur like... a day's walk from here? And it's close to four in the afternoon..."

"True. Maybe we should stay here for the night. it would give us some time to celebrate and train a little bit for the next challenge." Seymour also wanted to check the weather to make sure the weather wouldn't be a problem. Oh, and buy some more pokeballs.

Jake scratched his head. I guess they would be staying in this Podunk town just a bit longer,
"Yeah, and Phebe, we'll get you a room wherever we are staying too, so you can start to see what the sweet life is like!"

Phoebe nods in agreement, and you make the arrangement with the hotel. Pokeballs turn out a bit harder to get, as the local store sell artisanal pokeball instead of mass produced ones.

After sharing a meal in the hotel's dining room, you look outside to see the storm has come in. The rain is pretty bad already, but you can see flashes of lightning in the distance. "Wow. Good thing we didn't leave today."

OOC: Seymour, you can drop your pokedollar to Low, to increase your pokeball to Below Average, if you want.

Seymour had gotten back from tracking down some pokeballs just in time to avoid the worst of the rain. However, he thought the storm might be a good opportunity to train in a unique sort of terrain. Stormy terrain. And he doubted his water pokemon would mind getting wet.

"The Storm is looking pretty rough out there, but I think I still want to train with some of my water pokemon. Then maybe come back inside and relax and watch a movie or something. Feel free to join me, but don't feel obligated to." After dinner, Seymour would go switch up his pokemon team and head outside for some training.

---

I will take that pokeball deal. Also, switching up my team before heading out into the storm to train. I will switch my team to: Lombre, Magikarp x2 (Magnus and Marigold), Mantyke, Nommlin, Staryu.

Jake looked at Seymour like he was crazy,
"Out in that weather?! You will catch a cold, or some zaps!"

The normally adventurous Jake was not going outside in a storm! But,
"Skipper can go with to enjoy the stormy weather maybe, if you don't mind including him on training."

He had considered rearranging his team, but they did well in the challenge, so he decided to keep them as is for now. While waiting for Seymour to return from the rainy training, he let Bandy and Tiefee loose to raise moderate hell in the hotel. It was good for their morale (and would likely keep himself and Pheobe amused until it was time to turn in.

It doesn't take long for Seymour to get wet, and to discover how bad the 'worst' of the rain is. Unfortunately, it turns out things can always get worst, as the rain not only goes beyond just downpour and into what feels like a continuous stream of water. And with the wind driving it almost sideways, there's no way to protect yourself from the freezing drench.

And then the lightning starts.

Phoebe gives a surprised cry as a loud boom shakes the hotel, the lights shutting off for almost a minute before returning. The other guest sitting around in the lobby look outside, a bit worried at how severe the storm is. Jake has something else to worry about, though...

During the short-lived power failure, both Bandy and Tiefee disappeared.

Worry about?  Nah. Jake wasn't too concerned about his most mischievous pokemon vanishing into the dead of night. It even reminded him of his younger days! He simply released growler with the simple instruction,
"Oh, make sure they don't get into too much trouble."

He was a bit more concerned about Seymour, Jake moved to the door and tried to get it open without getting too much rain in. He shouted out,
"Hey Seymour, have enough training yet?!"

Seymour had, in fact, had enough training. He had made an honest attempt to train despite the weather, but it was definitely an unsafe environment and would be irresponsible to stay out in such severe weather. His Lombre's rain dish was nearly flipping inside out like an umbrella, his Staryu couldn't do any aerial acrobatics without flipping end over end, and his little Mantyke nearly got blown away altogether! (Although the little pokemon almost seemed to enjoy the experience).

In the end, Seymour and all six of his water pokemon piled back into the pokemon center for some recuperation when they heard Jakey. "Yeah, I think the training is going to need to be postponed. How are things in here?" Seymour took off his vest and wrung it out like a wet towel. He might as well have been swimming.

Before you can find something to dry yourself, a loud trumpet fills the air, causing a few guest to shout in panic. Looking across the room, you see a panicked Donphan running across the hall, not paying attention to anything in it's path.

The poor Donphan was probably scared by the storm, Seymour assumed. But unfortunately the powerful pachyderm could really hurt someone. Or itself. Seymour wasted no time doing his best to try and subdue it. At least a little.

"Captain Lombre, use Astonish, and Jett, use Fake Out. A flinch could be helpful here. Magnus, Marigold, distract it with some Splashes. Shuriken, start to Harden, and Turbo, be ready with a Bubblebeam if we need it. You two are the backup." It seemed Seymour was going to get some training in after all.

Jett's slap causes the elephant to pause, just long enough for a boy to recall it to it's pokeball. "I'm sorry... Baba's usually really calm, but she's really scared of ghosts..." He looks around, a bit confused. "I'm not sure what she saw that spooked her..."

"It's the ghost of the crimson lady!" An old woman say, ominously. "She lived in these forest, keeping herself forever young by bathing in jam... made of crushed Cherubi!"

One of the hotel's bellhop sighs heavily. "Alright, grand-ma, that's enough of your stories..." He leads her away, telling you "don't listen to her, she always makes up stories like that."

"You ungrateful brat! I'll let the boogie dancing Grimsnarl take you!"

The people around you just shake their head. You get distracted when you hear the clatter of large pots tumbling down in a nearby corridor, close to the hotel's small restaurant.

Jake wasn't sure about ghosts... of people. Ghost type pokemon definitely existed... but ghost-type people? That was absurd!  There was a much more rational explanation for this... some of his pokemon were rustling up some trouble. He decided to let Seymour in on his theory... but quietly,
"Ey, Seymour, don't worry. Its probably just a Tiefee and Bandy causing some trouble. They ran off when the thunder hit."

"That sounds... frightening," replied Seymour to the old woman. He hoped his Impidimp wasn't into boogie dancing if it ever evolved into a Grimsnarl.

To Jakey, he said, "Even so, we should probably go take a look. Could also be another pokemon scared of the storm like that Donphan. Let's take a peek, then I gotta change into some dry clothes."

Seymour recalled all his pokemon except Staryu. "Shuriken, I'll need you in ninja-mode for this investigation. Minimize and Harden as much as possible, then use Camouflage to blend into the surroundings. Stay ready while Falkner and I look into this."

As you push the kitchen's door open, you see an angry looking cook commanding a blue monkey. "Get that thief out of here!"

Looking where he's pointing you see Bandy ducking under a long table, carrying a bottle of juice with her.

"Woah, a wrecker!" Jake said, as if he didn't know the thieving pokemon. He gave a knowing wink to Seymour as he continued,
"I always wanted one of them. Let a real pokemon trainer handle this!"

Jake then dramatically threw a pokeball at bandy to 'catch' her.

Bandy dodges your pokeball, followed by a stream of scalding water from the monkey. Before you can wind up for another throw, the Wreckoon opens a door on the wall, revealing an open shaft that she climbs in.

Seymour was impressed with Jakey's plan to return Bandy to it's ball without taking blame for the situation, and was equally surprised when Bandy dodged the attempt.

"What has gotten into that pokemon?" asked Seymour. He watched curiously to see how Jakey would handle the situation next. Was that really even his Wrekoon?

Jake did his best not to appear surprised that his pokemon evaded his attempt to recall it. He admired his pokemon's pluck but was a bit annoyed that the pluck was interfering with his evening.  Then again, maybe this was bandy's way of playing? Still, he couldn't look like he was having too much fun and ruin the ruse. He asked the staff,
"Where does that door go? I can chase 'em down, but I don't want to make a mess."

"I sent food to the third floor with it... so that bandit should be on the second floor." The cook says, looking quite unhappy with the interruption. "Now get this taken care of, before the entire diner service is ruined!"

Heading to the second floor, your hear a man's cry of terror from the third floor.

"Is that your pokemon causing that ruckus too, Falkner? Why are they running wild anyway? We could get kicked out of the building if we don't get things under control soon. And believe me, tonight of all nights we do not want to get kicked out." He gestured at his still-soaked clothes for emphasis.

"Should we split up, or both head for the noise?" Seymour was ready to head to whatever floor Jakey decided not to go to, or to floor three if Jakey thought they should both investigate the most recent cry of terror.

Jake wasn't sure if it was his pokemon. He understood Seymour's frustration, but didn't feel like he was to blame for the situation,
"I don't know why pokemon are running wild. Maybe the thunder spooked them into acting wild?"

In terms of where to go next,
"I'll try to catch up with the wrecker, you can check out the scream."

It takes a big of searching to find Bandy, who picked a discreet corner to enjoy her prize. She seems to really love that juice. Really love it... Looking closer at the label, you see it Pecha liqueur...


As Seymour reaches the third floor, he sees a man in a tie-dye shirt holding a pale looking Chikorita. "Mint? Mint!? Come on, wake up! What did this to you!?" He shouts, cradling the grass pokemon.

Jake put his hands on his hips when he confronted Bandy, but couldn't bring himself to scold the scamp,
"Alrighty, you got your juice, now where is fee-fee? Is he out scaring the guests or what?"

He was willing to give bandy a chance to lead the way to Fee-fee, but if Bandy was still uncooperative or too tipsy to be of help, he'd simply return it and head up to the third floor to rejoin Seymour.

Seymour rushed over to the man with the injured Chikorita, worried. "What happened? Was it attacked?" He looked for any signs as to what had happened.

It wasn't until a few moments later that he registered the guy was wearing tie-dye. But when Seymour did notice, he made sure the guy didn't look like he was actually a member of Team Gaia.

Bandy waves her hammer vaguely in the direction of an open air vent in the ceiling, before trying to climb over Jake's back in an attempt to recover the bottle of alcoholic juice.


As Seymour gets close, you see the man clearly wears the same clothes as all the other members of Team Gaia. It could be a coincidence, but you don't remember seeing anyone else dressed that way since you arrived in Cadien.

The man looks at you, concerned. "I don't know! She dissapeared when the lights went out, and I just found her! I can't seen any wounds. Her heart is beating fast, but I can barely feel her pulse... I don't know what's wrong!"

Just as you get near, you notice a black shape from the corner of your eye, but it's gone when you turn to look.

As he noticed the man's outfit, Seymour's concern for the Chikorita began to morph into concern for himself. And Jakey. And Phoebe. And all of their pokemon. And what was that thing he had seen out of the corner of his eye? Seymour was beginning to fight back the urge to panic.

"Just... bring it to the pokemon center, I guess," Seymour replied, backing away slowly. He the turned to rush back the way he had come so that he might join back up with both of his friends. He needed to warm them Team Gaia was here.

Jake sighed as Bandy was only half helpful and pulled her back into her pokeball. Jake then tried to figure out how to get into the ceiling vent. Was he even small enough to fit? If not, would any other of his pokemon be able to fit?

Before crawling into any vent, he called into it,
"Fee-Fee, come back!"

Jake calls out to the vent, and soon hears a woman cry out in surprise in the nearest room. Fee-fee soon comes out of the vent, giggling. Moments after, a very angry man, looking half-undressed, opens the door. "What do you think you're doing, spying on people!?" He shouts, looking red as a tomato.


Seymour quickly makes his way back down the stairs as the goon gathers up his companion, but as you head down, you have an ominous feeling. As though the darkness of the night wasn't cause only by the storm outside...

Seymour paused on the stairs and shuddered. What was this dark feeling? He wished he had the answer, but since he didn't, he released his Staryu. "Shuriken, keep us protected with your Light Screen. I feel like some dark forces are afoot right now..."

Seymour and Shuriken then continued onward until they met back up with Jakey so that Seymour could share all he had observed. Both about Team Gaia and about the dark forces plaguing his peripherals.

Jake knew how to handle angry people. Although, sometimes it backfired and made them more mad. He adopted his most haughty look,
"You think I'd climb around spying at people? I wouldn't even be able to fit my whole body in there. I'm not some little kid! A saw my Fee-fee fly away when the thunder scared the heck out of it, and I just wanted to get it back."

Jake then emphatically gestured to Fee-fee and gestured for it to come so he could comfort it,
"Please use a nice voice, feefee is still a bit skittish from its last trainer's abuse and I don't want it running off again!"

"Well keep her in her pokeball and don't let her get in other people's room!" The man shouts before slamming the door. And the moment he's not looking, Fee-fee blows a raspberry toward the door.

Seymour hears the slam as he reaches the second floor, reuniting the two of you.

"What was that all about?" asked Seymour. Then he held up a hand and withdrew his question. "Nevermind. It's probably better if I don't know. And we've got bigger problems, (I hope)"

Seymour leaned in and spoke in hushed tones. "Team Gaia is here. And I also spotted... something, out of the corner of my vision. I don't know what is going on here, but it's not good. That's why I have Shuriken keeping up a Light Screen."

Jake shrugged,
"The spooking got to you too? Well, everything is normal here. I caught that wreckoon, and I got Feefee back."

Shrugging again, Jake suggested,
"We can tell the cook or whoever that we got the wreckoon caught, but I don't know what to do about Gaia... call the military? They have a gym in town, so they could probably respond quick."

"You are feeling the power of the Blood Moon!" The old woman from earlier just seems to... appear behind Seymour, seemingly out of nowhere. "When the moon grows red, the Dark pokémons are at their strongest, and their tricks are at their most dangerous! Beware..."

"ENOUGH grand-ma!" The bellhop says, coming up the stairs to get his family member. He drags her back down, muttering "you really need to go to bed."

"The forces of darkness surrounds this hotel! Mark my words!" Is the last you hear of her before she's dragged away.

Jake looked at the old woman confused,
"Man, we got to get out of this town. It is weird."

Seymour nodded in agreement with Jakey's opinion. Even so,vue couldn't help but ask the old woman, "The blood moon's powers are potent even with all these storm clouds covering the sky? How might a person protect themselves from such dark forces?" Regardless of the old woman's answer though, Seymour's next course of action would be to find a phone to contact the authorities with. They needed to warm the authorities about Team Gaia.

Alas, the old woman is already out of sight before you can as her. And when you pull out your phone to call the authorities, you're met with a message: Due to connection problems, you are currently in off-line mode. We apologize for the inconvenience.

Seymour looked at his phone in frustration. "Gah! No service! We should probably try and track down a manager or security guard and let them know Team Gaia is on the premises. Then I would be fine with holing up in our room until this storm blows over." Seymour kept looking over his shoulder as if expecting a pokemon to attack from the shadows at any moment. He kept his Staryu close too.

You head down, looking for the closest employee. It seems the other patrons decided to head to their rooms, and even Phoebe is no longer waiting for you in the main foyer. That's when you hear Phoebe scream. "Let go of me!" It's followed by multiple squawks of anger from Trio.

"You were supposed to bring the amulet back to us! Now where is it?"

"I don't have it anymore! I lost it when I was chased!"

"Thunder Punch!" Another squawk from Trio, this time weaker.

You get around the corner, and see your street urchin friend held by one of the Team Gaia grunt, while a second one stands next to an Alolan Graveler, gloating over the unconscious form of Trio.

"Hey! Keep your hands off my friends!" yelled Seymour. It seemed Phoebe had gotten involved with a bad crowd, but that didn't matter. She needed help and she needed it now.

Seymour tossed out his Lombre and said, "Captain, use Mega Drain on that Graveler. Knock it out!" He didn't like his prospects of fighting an electric pokemon when his entire team was currently water types, but he wasn't about to cower away. Besides, Jakey had some non-water types too.

Jake had a couple of good options, but he didn't want to cause too much collateral damage. He released Skipper with a word of caution,
"Mud bomb that graveller, and don't miss!"

If they succeeded in this fighting without too much of a mess, he could also show his 'caught' bandy to the owner and hopefully get compensated for acting as helpful muscle.

Surprised by the sudden attack, the Graveler fires off an electrical blast blindly, causing the lights above you to explode in a shower of sparks. Once the flash fades... you realize the entire corridor has gone dark, with no light other than the emergency exit signs.

"Good move! Now fill the corridor with Stealth Rock!"

"What!?"

"Shuriken, illuminate and Harden! Captain Lombre, counter those rocks with your Bubble attack!" Seymour was glad that he still had his Staryu about, using Light Screen outside of the battle. Its illuminate ability wouldn't be anywhere near as bright as his Lapimage's glow, but would hopefully at least keep this part of the corridor from being pitch black. Even so, Seymour braced himself for potential rock impacts and hoped he didn't break any of his bones.

Jake chose not to take another pokemon out. Instead, he wanted to finish the fight with just skipper and Seymour. Hearing Seymour's orders to illuminate, he instructed Skipper to make use of the dark-time,
"Skipper, use foresight and then use mudbomb when you can see the enemy!"

He wasn't totally sure what stealth rock was, but he figured that the opponent couldn't see him because of the dark anyhow.

"How are we gonna leave if..."

"Argh..."

Skipper launches his Mud Bomb, hitting the Graveler squarely as you get a new view of the battlefield. The Graveler launches multiple stones into the air, where they float between you and the Team Gaia grunts. Lombre manages to clear the ones closer to you, but more of them are floating in the corridor.

But more importantly, the Graveler's trainer is collapsed on the floor, unconscious. "Tee? TEE?" The second grunt kneels next to her companion, trying to wake him up. For a brief moment, your gaze is drawn to a shadow slipping through an open vent.

It was too late for Seymour to use his Pokedex to identify what he had seen, so he tried searching his own memory to see if he could recall anything about a pokemon that looked like the one he had glimpsed. Regardless, he said to Captain Lombre, "Keep Bubble-ing those rocks away, Captain. Make a path for Skipper!"

Jake wasn't sure how well the graveller would function with its trainer KO'd, so he signaled for Skipper to advance down the corridor instead of pressing the assault with more mud bombs. The goal was to help Phoebe, not totally destroy team Gaia.

In addition to signaling Skipper down the hallway, he released FeeFee,
"Follow that pokemon!"

He wasn't sure what the deal with the pokemon was, but he had a feeling that Fee-fee was in the vents earlier looking for it.

In all your time in Hoenn, you've never even heard of a pokemon like that. Maybe it's a specie native to Cadien? You do think it has some sort of a dark aura...

FeeFee opens up the vent closest to you, and slips inside.

Lombre manages to open a path wide enough for Skipper to pass through, though it's close. Seeing someone passing through it's defenses, the Graveler roars and rolls toward Skipper, and starts to glow...

Jake smiles as the graveller begins its wind-up. Time for a battle of the titans!
"Skipper, use bide!"

As for Feefee. He'd need to follow-up with him later. He was curious what was going on in the vents, but there was only so much he could handle at once.

"Captain, keep your distance and keep using Bubble." He didn't want the Lombre to get in Jakey's way. Also, with Bubble, Seymour wasn't too concerned about friendly fire either. If he was remembering correctly, blasting Skipper with a water attack might actually be beneficial anyway.

Skipper braces himself for the attack... but as the Graveler roars, you realize it may not be enough. The Gaia Grunt's eyes grow wide as she sees the Graveler glow, and she fumbles for the pokemon's ball.

Too late.

The corridor shakes as the Graveler Self-destructs, filling the air with dust.

A Self Destruct! That wasn't good. "Duck and cover!" he yelled, following his on instructions. A moment after the blast, Seymour was running down the hall toward the source of the explosion. "Phoebe, are you okay!?"

As the self-destruct became clear, Jake ordered Skipper forward to shield everyone else, and hopefully minimize the collatoral damage,
"Quick! Shield us!"

Not trusting even the bulky skipper would be enough, Jake took cover too. Only after the blast did he emerge to check on skipper and return it to its pokeball. He'd then follow Seymour to check on Phoebe.

Thankfully, you were out of the blast range. Unfortunately, Phoebe and Skipper were not. Once the dust clears down enough for you to see, you Skipper still standing, though injured.

As you get to the end of the corridor, you see Phoebe and the Gaia grunt are also hurt, and stunned by the sudden explosion.

"Captain, see if you can help Skipper. Jett, Shuriken, keep Team Gaia pinned," said Seymour, releasing Jett from his pokeball as he approached. Seymour himself rushed to help Phoebe. "Are you okay? What happened?" He had heard enough to get a good idea, but he wanted to hear it in Phoebe's own words.

Your pokemon dog-pile the Gaia grunt, while Captain waters Skipper to heal his wounds.

Phoebe groans as she sits up. "These guys chassed me down here. They said they would give me money for the amulet I stole yesterday, but when I said I didn't have it, they got angry and beat up Trio."

"Hey! Let go of me!" The grunt shouts, unable to move.

"Where are the authorities when you need them?" Jake complained as he did his best to tie up the currently unconscious team Gaia grunt. It was lucky that he had gotten the amulet, otherwise Gaia would probably have their hands on it by now. And now they had a captured grunt to interrogate,
"Hey, you, we might let you go if you tell us what is up with this amulet anyway. Why do you want it so bad?"

The woman groans. "I... We were told to get it..." She suddenly looks confused. "I... think? I... why can't I remember..." She looks dazed, like she has trouble focusing on you.

Seymour's brow wrinkled and he kneeled down near the woman's head. He snapped his fingers in front of her face. "Hey! Focus! This is important." Obviously something strange was going on here, and Seymour tried to figure out what that 'something' was. He pulled out his Pokedex and scanned around with his eyes. If that mysterious pokemon had returned and was causing this, then maybe he could be quick enough to read its entry this time.

You scan around, but the only pokemon you find are the ones pining the Gaia Grunt. And FeeFee, popping out of the air vent to tug at Jake's sleeve, pointing down the corridor.

Phoebe frowns as she looks at the grunt. "What's wrong with her? Is she drunk? She wasn't drunk five minutes ago..."

"Oh, sure, that's convenient." Jake sarcastically noted, assuming the grunt was playing dumb.  Before Jake could do something rash to try to get the grunt to cooperate, Feefee distracted him.

"Ah, can you guys hand this from here, I am going to check out what feefee found. Maybe one of us should tell the owner about the attack too."

Given the state of the hallway post self-destruct, Jake already figured the owner knew SOMETHING was up.

Before anyone could object though, Jake was already on his way down the corridor, pokedex in hand.

"We've got this. Do what you gotta do," Seymour replied. He and his pokemon worked at getting the grunts down to the lobby while Jakey did his own investigations. If any of the grunts tried anything, Seymour still had his Mantyke and two Magikarps in reserve.

Seymour keeps watch over the grunts while, Jake follows Feefee. After he leaves, Phoebe asks with a grin "So... do we dig through their pockets?"

Jake follows Feefee.
Jake follows Feefee.

Error: Connection Lost

"Dig through their pockets? Like, for clues?" Obviously she couldn't m an for valuables, right? That seemed unethical. "I would normally leave that to the police, but it could be a long time until they arrive due to the storm. I guess it makes sense to check them for anything super important." In the elevator down to the lobby Seymour would help search the Gaia grunts.

Looking through the grunt's pockets, you find what looks like a propaganda pamphlet. It talks about how humanity is abusing the world, and should behave more like pokemon do. It's especially scalding toward the king and the military, declaring their actions to be abuse of pokemon.

Phoebe reads the paper, frowning. "That last line about 'becoming one with pokemon' sounds a bit... ominous to me."

Error: Out of range.
This message was last edited by the player at 02:36, Mon 08 Aug 2022.

"As it should," Seymour replied to Phoebe. "I have heard that Team Gaia even encourages their pokemon to eat other pokemon that they have defeated." He shuddered at that, thinking of what could have become of the Dodrio. Or of his and Jakey's pokemon if they had lost, for that matter.

"Yeah, these guys can't be put behind bars soon enough."

Inside the hotel, Seymour hears "It's over here!"

A couple of hotel employees run up to you, looking worried. "What happened? We heard an explosion?"

"Who are these guys?"

Error: Still out of range.
This message was last edited by the player at 03:30, Thu 11 Aug 2022.

"These goons here are members of a terrible organization called Team Gaia," explained Seymour. "Their Graveler was responsible for the explosion. They were harassing Phoebe here, and we had to take steps to subdue them. Are you able to contact the authorities? I have seen at least one other member elsewhere in the building as well. Someone with a colorful shirt and a Chikorita."

The employees frown. "Is that true?"

Phoebe nods. "Yeah, these guys are creeps who wanted me to steal something for them!"

"Wait... a guy with a Chikorita? He's with the hotel's nurse. I'll call up the cops on the landline."

"That is a good idea. The sooner they can get here, the better. I should note though that I never actually witnessed the guy with the Chikorita do anything bad. But Team Gaia all wear the same type of uniform, and their organization does some truly horrendous stuff. This is not my first run-in with them, unfortunately."

Error: Out of range.

"For now, you should probably go back to your room. The police will probably want to talk to you when they get here."

Seymour nodded in agreement. "That is probably a good idea. I need to change out of these wet clothes anyway. And we have another friend we are waiting to hear back from." If Phoebe didn't have anything else to do or say, he would walk with her back to their room to wait for Jakey and/or the police.

A sopping wet Jake also headed back to their room with a face that was a mix of annoyance and disappointment. The source of which immediately became evident as he opened his mouth,
"The stupid pokedex couldn't even ID the pokemon!  I slapped it a couple times to get it working, and when I was doing that, the stupid pokemon went and snatched the stupid amulet. Whatever, I was hoping I could sell that for good money."
Jake then pulled the sheets off of his bed and used them to help dry himself from the rain he had found himself in following the mystery pokemon.
"Any better news from you? Hopefully the Gaia losers weren't as crafty as that pokemon."

Jake thought about showing Seymour the image of the mystery pokemon, but realized he needed to review the photo first... the photo might also include the mystery man!

"That is... unfortunate," Seymour replied to Jakey when he mentioned the amulet was taken. "But no, the Team Gaia members were not very crafty. The authorities have been called and will probably stop by to get our side of the story." It didn't even really occur to Seymour that Jakey may not want to deal with officers of the law.

One of the hotel's employee leads you to your room, promising that the light should come back soon.

It take about fifteen minutes for the cop to knock at your door, accompanied by a woman's voice. "Mister... Seymour and Falkner? I'm officer Stewart, of APD. Could I have a word with you?"

Jake actually didn't mind talking to the police so long as he was not a suspect. And even when he was a suspect, it could be fun to lie to the authorities. He had just gotten himself mostly dried when the police came knocking.  Bedsheet still on his head from drying his hair, he opened the door and let Steward in,
"No problemo, so long as you don't bring the rain in. Its nasty out there."

The officer, a green-haired woman, steps into the room. "Good evening. I understand two of you are trainers? Could I have a look at your pokedex while you tell me what happened?"

Jake nodded as she greeted them, but then crossed his arms when she asked to look at the pokedex. He was not sure exactly what the rules were about their pokedexs... so he tried to play the military and the police against each other,
"When we got here, we were told y'all had stuff in our pokedex so you could check on us whenever. So if you can't do that, then you don't got clearance to look at them at all, sorry, that's the rules. Ask the military if you have any questions about that. I can tell you what happened though."

Jake wasn't sure how much he trusted the police in this town. Seemed if town was under the grip of Team Gaia, it would be this hippy-town. One more reason to get out.

Seymour was a bit surprised by Jakey's reaction at first, but quickly realized he shouldn't have been. He actually probably should have expected Jakey to be paranoid of authority figures of the law by now.

Seymour himself felt obligated to comply, but still held off on handing over his Pokedex. It didn't hurt to be at least slightly paranoid considering their current circumstances. "Could we at least see your own identification first? You know, in case there are Team Gaia members running around in disguise?" He doubted that was the case here, but still checked to make sure the officer was appropriately drenched for someone who had come in from the storm outside. Even with an umbrella, a person would still get at least a little wet.

The officer raises and eyebrow, before pulling out her own pokedex. The design is somewhat different, seemingly made to be tougher than the sleek design of yours. Pressing a button, the screen displays the officer's ID.

Lorraine Stewart
Officer         APD
Badge no. 4137
_{Lorraine Stewart}
^{Authorized by Argenvers Police Department}

Once you've had the chance to look at it, she places it back in her uniform's pocket. The storm knocked down our local Wi-Fi tower, so we're unable to remotely access your pokedex at the moment. Hence the need for me to verify them manually."

Jake relaxed slightly. I guess that made sense. He wasn't totally sure what wi-fi was, but Seymour probably did.  In any case, he heard enough to hand over his pokedex,
"With Team Gaia running around, you can never be too careful."

He went on to describe most of the events. He figured that the officer did her due diligence in questioning others, so he limited the amount of lying. The only part he omitted was his rendezvous with the mysterious man, instead opting to explain the same story he gave Seymour, the weird pokemon snatched it when Jake was trying to catch it.

Satisfied, Seymour handed over his Pokedex as well and recounted his own side of the story. When he was done, he asked Officer Stewart, "So why do you think Team Gaia is here? What was that thing they wanted? And what was that pokemon we saw but couldn't identify?" There were so many questions and so few answers.

The officer shrugs as she fiddles with Jake's pokedex. "The probably thought your friend got her hands on something they tried smuggling. Sounds like an historical artifact of some sort. As for the..."

She pauses and frowns as she looks at the device. She quickly grabs her own pokedex, holding both close. "Scanning... pokemon not native to Cadien. Please conn..." She closes off her pokedex, suddenly looking worried. "Excuse me, I need to verify somethin."

She hands Jake his pokedex back before leaving. You can see she was looking at the unknown pokemon you glimpsed.
This message was last edited by the GM at 14:11, Mon 29 Aug 2022.

Jake did his best to cover up his nerves when the officer was looking at the pokedex, but his concern creeped through when she said she needed to verify something. After getting his pokedex back, a smug smirk crossed his face. He showed the pokedex with the picture of the unknown pokemon to Seymour.
"Wow, that pokemon must really be a spook if just seeing it gave her such a fright."

He wasn't sure what to do next...
"So... should we try to hear what she is verifying... just wait... or..."

Jake trailed off. He wanted to get confirmation of who he was actually working for, but even if they overhear her conversation, he may still not get a straight answer.

"I guess so..." Phoebe says. Looking at Jake's dex, she adds "I guess she's more worried about that pokemon than that... artifact? What's an artifact, anyway?"

"An artifact is an old, usually important, item. That must be why Team Gaia wanted it. The question is why is it important?" Seymour shrugged since he didn't have any theories. Then he continued, "But yeah, she definitely seems more concerned about the pokemon. If it isn't from this region, I wonder what region it is from. And how it got here." Cadien was notoriously strict with its boarders.

In the end, Seymour decided to let Jakey decide if he wanted to try overhearing or not. He himself plans on flat out asking afterward, but there was no guarantee he would get a truthful answer.

Jake cracked open the door to see if the woman was just talking in the hallway. If she was, he'd try to eavesdrop. If she were not chatting in the hallway, he would just close the door and be a good boy.

It's a bit hard to heard, but you can just make out...

"I heard of those from my cousin. He said they only live in the Kaskade region. How did it get here?"

"Do you think it has to do with the APB we got?"

"It must be..."

The officer and her companion walk away before you can hear the rest.

Jake relayed what he heard, followed by,
"Know anything about that region? Any big cities in that area?"

He wasn't sure what an APB was, so he also asked about that,
"Y'all know what an APB is?"

Seymour rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "I know APB means all-points bulletin. It is an alert for law enforcement over a wide area. I don't know if I know a whole lot about the Kaskade region though..." He shared what he could recall with Jakey.

"At any rate, it sounds like whatever is going on probably isn't only happening in one location."

---

How much do I know about the Kaskade region?

"So... it's a foreign pokemon? And they were on the look out for something like that?"

As you ponder over this, the light finally returns, though you still hear rumbling of thunder outside.

OOC: The Kaskade region is almost on the other side of the world, on the same continent as Unova, though on the opposite end. On the Earth, it would be the equivalent of the Pacific North-West of the US.

Unless you want to try to sneak outside to spy on the cops, or something along those lines, we can skip to the next morning.

The next morning, you check out of your room, without meeting the cops again. What they saw on your pokedex must have shaken them enough that they had other things than you to worry about. The hotel employees also seem a bit concern, but it's hard to blame them, considering the damage that happened last night. And with the new morning, you're ready to head out to your next challenge.

On Route 104.

By the way, now that your pokedex have a net connection again, you can learn more about Kaskade and Umbralu with a Google search. Because of course I didn't come up with the two myself.