Daisy waited in the cover of the shadows and dense underbrush of the deepest part of the Sylvan forest. It was a good place for hiding, and this was her own special spot. Her brother didn't know it, but she had found his secret area early on in life and had been coming to spy on him ever since.

Every day at noon, Quill would slip away from everyone else and come to this spot deep in the forest. Daisy would watch from her hiding place as he stood next to the seedling that she could only guess he himself had planted there. He would sit there staring at it for the longest time before taking out his piccolo and playing a song that was said to be the song of the forest guardian.

Daisy didn't see what was so special about his piccolo. The ocarina made from a conch shell in the museum was much more interesting, but whenever she asked her big brother about it he would simply say that it wasn't his to play. She couldn't figure out what he meant by that. His team had recovered both the piccolo and the ocarina and donated both to the museum. If he was allowed to play the piccolo whenever he wanted, he should be allowed to play the ocarina too.

She watched as he reached into his bag, no doubt to pull out his piccolo, but instead he took out what looked like a bunch of fruit tied into a cloth. He set it on the ground and untied it at the top so that the cloth spread out on the ground like a picnic blanket with the small pile of food in the center.

"Well?" Quill said. "Are you going to come eat lunch with me, Daisy? You must get hungry hiding in those bushes all the time."

Daisy flinched. She couldn't see how Quill could do stuff like that, even though he was the leader of the famous Team Sleuth. It seemed unnatural, but maybe that was why she respected him so much. She crawled out of her hiding place and sat on the ground next to the fruit opposite her brother.

"So you knew?" She asked.

Quill nodded. "From day one. I bet you're wondering why I come out here every day to play a song for the sapling."

"Sort of…" Daisy picked up a Pecha berry and bit into it. It was a little sweeter than she would have preferred, but she didn't really care about the taste.

Quill looked up at the sapling, which was already about three times his height, though nothing compared to the size of the other trees in Sylva. He had a strange look in his eyes that Daisy loved. It was the sort of look that seemed both happy and sad at the same time where his eyes would look sad and he would still be smiling honestly. She had always assumed that this look was what really defined her brother. It seemed to make him even stronger than he already was.

"Maybe I'll tell you one of these days." He said. "The whole story, I mean. For now I can tell you this much; a good friend of mine had to go away one day. At that time Team Sleuth was in a lot of trouble for something we didn't do. Going back to Sylva was something that was out of the question for a long time after she left. When we cleared our names, I wanted to make sure that when she came back, we all had a proper place to stay. We had our own Treehouse once; that's why I decided to grow another one. This is the tree that I'm growing for that friend."

"You're making a Treehouse?" Daisy asked. "I thought only Kricketune could do that. Is it because of the piccolo?"

Quill turned away from the tree to look at his little sister. She looked a lot like he did when he was younger, of course, since he had once been a Cyndaquil himself before he evolved. She was a lot smarter and braver than he could have hoped to be back then. "So how's school going?"

"You're avoiding my question again!" Daisy snapped at him. "I hate when you do that! You always do that right before you go off on some dangerous mission and I don't see you for days or even weeks!"

"Do I?" Quill asked awkwardly. Daisy could see right through him. She could from the moment she hatched. "Well it's true we will be leaving again soon. But that's not for another couple of days yet. But really, how is school?"

"It's fine…" Daisy said irritably. "I don't see why I have to go. The practical stuff is more useful than things you read out of books, isn't it?"

"You'd be surprised what you can learn from a book. It's true I never got the best grades when I was in school, but the things Espeon has taught me have helped me out more times than I can count!"

There it was again. Daisy had noticed Quill do that whenever he mentioned their mom, but never asked about it before. "Why do you do that?"

"What do you mean?"

"You call Mom by her name. Why is that? I'm allowed to call her Mom at school. Why can't you even if you're in some famous Investigation Team?"

"Force of habit, I guess…" Quill ignored Daisy's puzzled expression and bit into an apple. "It's not like I'm not allowed or that I think I'm too old for it, I just don't do it. So have you decided what your team's name is going to be yet?"

At this Daisy's eyes lit up. They might have been complete opposites when it came to school, that is, Quill got bad grades because of his nervousness and she got bad grades because of her overconfidence, but when it came to Investigation Teams, it was suddenly easy to see that they were related.

"I'm thinking about maybe Team Pyro! You know, I've already got sketches made for my team base when I graduate. I've decided I'm going to have mine right next to the Investigator's Brigade building, that way we can always see each other and go on missions together! And I've already decided that my very first mission will be an outlaw mission, just like yours!"

Quill laughed. "And what will your teammates do? Have you already designed their rooms for them in your HQ? And how will you compromise if one of them wants to go on a rescue mission first?"

Daisy tilted her head. "Team members? I almost forgot about that."

"You mean you'll be graduating in a couple of years and you haven't found anyone to form a team with yet?" Quill asked.

Daisy shook her head. "No… I guess not. Maybe I could just form my own team and work by myself until someone else asks to join like you did."

"That's not entirely how it happened." Quill admitted. "It's true I didn't have a teammate in mind until the very last minute, but I never worked alone."

Again Quill got that strange look. Daisy began to wonder who this partner of his was. It was apparently the same person who he had planted the seedling for. She was able to figure that much out at least.

"So about that mission." Quill said, snapping Daisy out of her thoughts. "There's a reason this one's going to be so big." He leaned down closer so he could whisper it in Daisy's ear, which he knew would just get her more excited. "I already asked Espeon and she says it's okay. If you want, you'll be coming with us."

Daisy's smile broadened as what her brother was saying slowly started to sink in. "I'm going on a mission with Team Sleuth! Really?"

Quill nodded. "Really. We'll be leaving in two days. I want you to go to Kangaskhan's storage and take whatever items you feel you'll need from our account. There are plenty of items there, so you shouldn't have to stop at the shop for anything."

"I can pick whatever I want? Even one of those awesome Pecha Scarves?" Pecha scarves were one of Daisy's favorite items and they had really grown in popularity among the academy students lately.

"If that's what you want. You can use any hold items you want. Oh, hold on. I've got an even better idea." Quill dug around in his bag and pulled out a red bow tie with white polka dots all over it. "I don't use this as much anymore, but I have a feeling it would help you out a lot. This was the item I got when I first formed Team Sleuth. It's called a Joy Ribbon."

"I've heard about those. They raise your level faster, right? You'll really let me borrow it?"

"What? Are you insane! I'm not going to let you borrow my precious Joy Ribbon!" Daisy looked at him in shock for a moment before he continued. "I'm giving it to you. To keep. It's all yours, kiddo!"

Daisy nearly shouted from excitement as she took the Joy Ribbon from her brother and attached it to her neck the way Quill used to when he was younger. Daisy had seen a few paintings Smeargle had painted of Quill from back then and she had always liked the bow he wore, even if she didn't know what it was until then. She had heard of Joy Ribbons before, but she never saw what they looked like.

"How do I look?" she asked.

"Like me…" Quill admitted. "I'll admit it looks better on you. Since I'm a Quilava now and I mainly walk on all four paws, it looked a little silly. It seems too easy to level up with it now anyway. I prefer to have a little bit of a challenge at least."

"You're amazing!" Daisy said. "Too strong to even hold the Joy Ribbon anymore. Aren't you going to have some sort of hold item though?"

"I'm thinking about using a Defense Scarf from now on. It should help during our mission if you get into trouble and I need to help you out. This won't be an easy mission for an academy student, you know."

Daisy nodded. "I got it. I think I'll go get ready right away!"

"The mission is two days from now. You don't have to rush so much."

Daisy got up and turned towards the direction she had come from. "I know, but now I'm so excited I don't think I'll even be able to sleep! I need to prepare right away!"

Quill smiled as he watched his sister run off. He ate a few more berries and packed up the rest of the fruit for later. He took out his piccolo and played the song for the sapling for a while before packing everything up and heading home.

Quill's Treehouse had been destroyed nearly five years ago, but when his team announced they'd be returning to Sylva for the time being, Smeargle and the construction team went to work right away to make them a new HQ in the Investigator's Brigade building. The floor map was basically the same as it had been in their old Treehouse, which made it much bigger than any of the other rooms in the building. A building where you had to live with several other Investigation Teams didn't feel much like a proper base though, no matter how much bigger their rooms were than most others.

In the main room, the bulletin board was filled more than ever before with dozens of job requests. Aside from Team Jurassic, theirs was the only with the Master rank, so it was to be expected. Quill looked again at the mission that he had picked for Daisy to join them on.

It was a simple mission; an escort through Dark Rift. Quill hadn't gone back there since he and Aamira had been led there by Mismagius. That had led to one of the worst times in his life when he was locked up in her castle for about a week, only to be rescued and imprisoned again just days later. It shouldn't be much trouble now though; only someone who was an Aura or Dark Reader and had been to Atra before could open the way into Atra. The client was also one who Quill had worked for before. He was scared of everything, though still pretty strong. As long as Daisy could keep up, the mission should be smooth sailing.

"Thinking about the mission again?" Lairon was curled up in his stone bed in the corner of the room. Since the floor map was similar to that of their Treehouse, the bedrooms were all in an upstairs level. Lairon, being a bad climber, had to stay in the main room since he couldn't climb the ladder to their dorms. They were planning on making him a bedroom on the main floor, but he insisted in staying in the main room. He enjoyed the big window and Delibird hardly ever missed them with Lairon there to take their messages for them.

Lairon went on quite a few missions himself, but he had recently suffered a bad injury from their last major mission and had only recently healed up enough to go on more missions. In two days, he would be accompanying Quill, Daisy, and their client, Dustox, on the mission. Their team would be crowded, but hopefully the mission would be well worth it.

"Yea…" Quill placed the job request back on the bulletin board. "I'm a little worried. Do you think Daisy's ready for this?"

"She'll be fine." Lairon reassured him. "Honestly, the way you obsess over her at times, people would think you're her father instead of her older brother."

Quill laughed. "I guess you're right. It's probably because of Aamira. You know, she loved little kids. Especially if she got a role in helping them grow up. Field day at the academy, hatching Latias and Manaphy… I think I can start to understand why she loved it so much."

"You sure that's it?" Lairon asked. "If you haven't noticed, Daisy acts a lot like her. Always rushing into dangerous situations, really smart, that temper…"

"Really? I hadn't noticed." Quill said sarcastically.

Out of the window, he could see that the sun had already started to set. As hasty as Daisy was, Quill had to admit that he should start prepping for their mission too. He only had tomorrow to get all of his stuff together.

"I won't keep you up." Lairon said. "You've been staying up so late for the past few weeks now. You should really try to get some rest."

Quill nodded and headed up the ladder to his room. Just like their old Treehouse, his bed was lined with metal and filled with coals. It was really warm whenever he burned them, which felt especially nice on a mid-spring night. And yet, even the coals couldn't help him sleep.

It had started much longer ago than Lairon realized; nearly half a year now. At first it was easy to keep going with a few restless nights here and there, but he soon realized that the nightmares had started to get worse and more frequent. Now they were happening nightly. He stared over at the table on the far side of the wall where Darkrai's Nightmare Gem was glowing eerily in the dark. What if something really was wrong? But then Aamira had been gone for nearly two years now. Why would she suddenly be in danger? And even if she was, there's no way what he was dreaming could have gone on for so long.

That night was just like any other. It started in a forest much like Sylva. In the distance through the fog, it was just barely possible to make out the towers of a looming castle. A human girl sat by a lake much like Vine City's own Lake Harmony, with the bottoms of her bare feet just barely touching the water's surface. Rocks were piled high around the edges and the sides of the lake were lined with orchids. The rest of the clearing looked like it had been purposefully planted a certain way, as if it was some sort of garden hidden in a secret grove. In the center of the lake was a huge tree with roots spread wide and high above water level. There was something glowing inside of it, but it was impossible to make out at this distance.

The sound of barking came from somewhere behind where the human sat. She would turn to the sound for barely a second, the only time Quill could ever see the red eyes that were so distinguishing for Aamira. Until he first saw her eyes, Quill had doubted, but after he had seen them he had no doubt that this human really was Aamira. It was true that many pokemon had red eyes, him included, but it wasn't the same with Aamira's. Aside from that, Quill didn't know how common red eyes were for humans.

Aamira would turn back to the lake and stare at the light reflecting off of the waves on the surface of the lake before getting up and running. The sound of her pursuers was louder by now. She ran confidently as if she was leading the chase, but Quill could also feel a dull fear that was urging her onward through the forest.

After running for a long time, a Fearow would appear out of nowhere and try to grab her. It miscalculated Aamira's speed and only managed to scratch up her back, though the wounds didn't look very good either way. She would continue running as the pokemon closed in on her.

She stopped at the edge of a cliff that led even further into the forest below. She would give a nervous glance to the strange looking mountain in the distance that was cut down the middle to create a V shape. After that she would bring her attention back to the pack of pokemon that had cornered her. Among them, a large canine that Quill didn't recognize would step forward.

"Hello Stoutland." Aamira would say in a voice that sounded like she was far from intimidated. "Come here on another one of your master's errands, I presume?"

"Your master as well as my own." The pokemon called Stoutland would growl. The strange thing is, he would really growl. Even though he didn't speak in words as Quill was used to, he could understand what it was saying perfectly. He assumed that Aamira could also. "I advise you to end your struggle now. Keep running and we will follow to the edges of Theria, such is the way of the Alphas."

"How sad." Aamira would say. "Chase and bark, as if you're good for nothing else."

Stoutland growled and bared his teeth. "The key. That's all he wants. Give Master the key and he may be somewhat lenient on your punishment for running away."

"As if that were true. I think I've got enough scars by now to prove that mercy isn't a part of his vocabulary."

"Then why do you continue to defy him? He is the king of your kind. You are the only human who would dare act this way!"

"I'm not sure, really." Aamira said. "Though I am sure of one thing; your mission is to capture me and bring be back home. To win, I don't need to defeat you, I just have to keep you from catching me."

"You've run out of ground to run on." Stoutland insisted. "Surrender now before you make things any worse for you than they already are."

"I shouldn't die." She said. "That's another thing I'm sure of too. I'm not sure why I'm sure, but I am. But still, if this key is so important to you, then as soon as I die, you'll have no way of finding it, correct?"

Stoutland's eyes widened. He realized at the last second what she was planning on doing. He charged forward, but Aamira had already stepped over the edge of the cliff. The bird pokemon circling above dove towards her in an attempt to catch her, but they were suddenly knocked away by a powerful blast of fire that had come seemingly from nowhere. Just as it looked like she was about to hit the ground, she whistled loudly and a Staraptor appeared out of the forest, catching her on its back and flying off.

More bird pokemon started to gather and followed after them. Stoutland, with some difficulty, managed to shake off the shock from the trick she had played and rallied the rest of his Alphas to continue the pursuit. The feeling of fear from being pursued slowly intensified until Quill bolted upright in his bed, shaking from the nightmare just as he had on any other night.

Had Aamira been able to escape those pokemon, or had she been captured? Maybe she was still on the run. But then, why was she running at all? From what Quill could tell, this had something to do with the king of her world, but aside from wanting a key, their conversation had been too vague for Quill to really be able to tell what he was after.

Quill stretched and got up. He looked out his window and frowned. It was drizzling lightly, making it somewhat overcast. The forest smelled great when it rained, but moist air always made him drowsy. He had hoped to get in a small mission that morning, but he probably wouldn't be able to move as fast as he normally did. He would have to spend the day making preparations for their mission the next day.

There were only a few people outside when he left Team Sleuth HQ. Most of them were shop owners or Investigation Team Members like himself. The majority of the city was made of plant and bug type pokemon. A lot of bug types generally had soft skin or dusted wings that made rain water problematic for them. Most grass types preferred sunny weather as well, so quite a few of the town's residents had stayed in late this morning.

Quill caught a glimpse of Daisy sitting on the swing outside of the school on his way to the main part of the town. She was surrounded by so many friends. Quill remembered how he had used to sit on that swing himself when he went to school there, though he was never surrounded by friends like this.

Out of the crowd he recognized one of the kids as Mudkip. Quill got the feeling that Daisy liked him a lot more than she normally let on. As far as the other students went, Mudkip was the only one that Quill ever heard of Daisy bullying. He didn't seem to mind though, strangely enough. She even referred to him as Old Snuffles because he always had a runny nose. It seemed strange, but maybe that was just the sort of friends they were.

Quill headed into town and stocked up on a few more items that he bought from the shop, items that their team had started to run low on, mostly, and then he took a few items out of storage for their mission the next day.

On his way back he was lucky enough to get a job request to help move some furniture outside of the new café that had opened up near the school. It was outdoor furniture mainly, but there was a lot of work to be done on the inside too. He really liked the balcony that was in the upper level of the Treehouse café. The floor was made from thin wooden planks supported by branches. The branches curved upwards to form something like bars that were spaced apart far enough to see out of, but not enough so that someone could fall off of the balcony.

While he was finishing up, he overheard a Luxio telling a Vigoroth something that really caught his attention.

"That's right!" She said. "A whole pack of them just swarmed in out of nowhere!"

"That really sounds troublesome…" Vigoroth replied. "Team Night has a Houndoom member, don't they? Have they gone to check it out?"

"They have, but Weavile and Gliscor got beat up pretty badly by that monster Houndoom leading the pack. Their own Houndoom was nowhere to be seen when they were finally rescued."

This caught Quill's curiosity immediately. "Excuse me. What was that about a pack of Houndoom?"

"Oh it's terrible!" Vigoroth's voice was shaking so bad that Quill had trouble understanding her at first. "Apparently a huge pack of Houndoom showed up in the western part of the forest this morning. Their leader is some sort of huge monster of a Houndoom. He's apparently twice the size of a normal Houndoom and has the biggest horns that anyone has ever seen on one. No one knows where they came from, which just makes it more worrying. Apparently this Houndoom led his pack through Miracle City a while ago. They attacked anyone who got in their path and burned anything else."

"Luckily since Miracle is one of the few cities constructed mainly of stone in the forest, nothing was too badly burned." Luxio added. "There's still quite a bit of damage that was done to the wooden structures, but at the very least the city's still standing."

"Why haven't I heard anything about it?" Quill asked.

"It's pretty recent news, so it's not surprising you haven't heard it. I came here visiting from Tempestas and was asked by Pikachu to deliver a message to Noctowl on my way here. He was meeting with the Investigation Teams of Vine City for their morning briefing when a Delibird from Miracle City came rushing in with the news. Immediately a few of the teams were dispatched to search for them. I stayed around for a while to see what would happen and soon one of the teams came back with bad injuries. According to them, the pack was going to set up camp at Stony Ridge for some protection against the rain and Noctowl sent a message to Team Night to get their Houndoom to act as an ambassador of sorts. I delivered Pikachu's message after that and talked about it with Noctowl for a while and when I was about to leave another team showed up with two of the members of Team Night being carried on their backs. After that I hurried here to find my friend Vigoroth who I had heard was working as part of the design and construction team assigned with putting together the interior of the café."

"And then you showed up." Vigoroth said. "I haven't heard anything else about this, though the Delibird do seem to be in a hurry to deliver some important message. It most likely has something to do with Houndoom. Unfortunately, that probably means that no one else has been found yet to hunt them down. You're the leader of Team Sleuth though, aren't you? Do you think you might be able to do something about this?"

"Well I have to, don't I?" Quill said. He realized that it would most likely mean calling off tomorrow's mission though. Daisy was going to be disappointed. "You said Stony Ridge, right? That's not a very difficult dungeon at least."

Back at the academy, Daisy and the rest of the kids were enjoying their recess. Daisy was playing tag with her friends and purposely only chasing after Mudkip. Just as she was about to catch him, she noticed her brother walking towards them looking grave. She stopped and ran towards him.

"Hey, is something wrong Quill?" she asked.

"Yea…" he didn't dare look Daisy in the eyes. Lairon was right when he said that her temper could be every bit as bad as Aamira's was. "Something really major just came up. There's a really bad outlaw not far from here with a whole gang of bandits. Odds are this is going to be a tricky mission, so I'm not entirely sure if we'll be able to go on our mission tomorrow."

"What!" Daisy said. "Well… Okay, I guess… I guess I understand why you have to do it. Just make sure to hit the bad guys once for me, okay?"

Quill smiled and nodded. "You got it, kiddo. I'll try to be home for dinner tonight, but I can't make any promises. These guys apparently just appeared out of nowhere and have already attacked a whole city. There's no way of telling how strong they are."

"But no one's stronger than you, right Quill?" Daisy said. "I know you can beat them!"

"Yea, you're right." He tried to sound more confident than he really felt. Normal Houndoom were one thing, but this monster Houndoom sounded like trouble. "It's too bad the rest of the team already left on their missions for today. I could probably use their help on this one. At the very least, it would let me get home sooner."

"You can do it." Daisy said. "I know you can because you're the best Investigator ever!"

"Yea, it'll be a piece of cake for this Quilava! Alright, tell Espeon not to wait on me if I don't come home on time for dinner. I asked a Delibird to deliver the roasted berry pie I made for desert if I don't come back on time."

"Roasted berry pie!" Daisy shouted excitedly. It had always been her favorite desert and she always loved it when Quill made it.

"But only if you eat your vegetables first."

"I know that. I really like vegetables." Espeon called for them to come back inside. She noticed Quill standing there and no doubt understood that something had happened. "I'll see you later!" Daisy ran towards their mom and started to tell her about the mission Quill was going on.

Quill headed back to Kangaskhan's storage to make some adjustments to his inventory. By now word of the Houndoom pack had spread throughout the city and everyone had already expected that Quill would be the one to go deal with them. Noctowl had tried to get some information from the others who had seen the pack, but apparently the pack's leader knew moves that they had never even seen before and all of the Houndoom were so fast that they couldn't even get a good guess as to how many there were.

Quill was about to head out when Noctowl stopped him. "There was one thing that they could all remember about this Houndoom. Apparently it had an attack that could turn their attacks against them. Sound familiar?"

Quill nodded. "Sounds like Quickpaw, the technique that Aamira had learned from Wynaut."

"Be careful." This coming from Noctowl was even more unnerving. He had known Quill since before he formed Team Sleuth with Aamira and Quill couldn't even remember the last time that Sylva's elder had told him to be careful.

As it turns out, being told to be careful was good advice. Though the dungeon had seemed the same as ever at first glance, Quill started to realize that the pokemon in the area had become more violent than normal. Though still not much stronger than they normally were, Quill still had to stay on his toes to deal with their sudden attacks.

Wandering through the dungeon took up more time than he would have liked. By the time he got to the top of Stony Ridge, the sun had already almost entirely disappeared. It looked like he wasn't about to make it back in time for dinner after all. What a shame too. He had to cancel dinner with Daisy and Espeon the previous week also. This week was even worse since Typhlosion was visiting. Either way, he had a job to do. He knew his family would understand.

Quill turned the corner to the area where he and Aamira had gone on their very first mission to defeat Charmeleon. He nearly jumped in surprise at their numbers. There had to be at least a dozen Houndoom, four or so Houndour, and sleeping in the center of them was the monster Houndoom everyone had been talking about.

He had expected the Houndoom's size to be exaggerated, but seeing it up close, Quill could tell that this wasn't the case. This Houndoom was eight or nine feet tall easy. The horns on its head twisted in a complete circle with the tips pointing forward near its muzzle. The horns and the bones all over its body were a sickly yellow color, which led Quill to believe it must have been fairly old. Around its neck was a pendant with a dark red crystal on it. The tips of its fangs were just visible beneath its upper lip. The claws looked like daggers and could easily put Weavile's claws to shame. Judging by the claw marks on all of the rocks nearby, Quill had to guess that it had been sharpening its claws recently to get ready for a battle.

"Uh… excuse me…" Quill said timidly as he came out of his hiding spot. A few of the Houndoom looked up at him, though they didn't seem to be too worried about him being there. They had obviously been in the middle of a nap and weren't in the mood for fighting right now. "Excuse me, but can I talk with you? I heard that your pack destroyed a good amount of a nearby city and injured a lot of people. Was there any sort of reason for it?"

"A fairly good reason." The giant Houndoom said without even bothering to open its eyes. "We were looking for someone and they were getting in the way."

"Well you've really upset a lot of people by hurting them like that. I was wondering if maybe you could move along now and look somewhere else? The rain stopped, so you don't have any reason to stay here right?"

"Wrong." The Houndoom stretched and yawned and stood up straight facing Quill. "You see, my partner is looking for a particular someone who he says is located somewhere in this forest. As such, we shall not be leaving until we find this pokemon."

"And what do you want with this pokemon?" Quill asked.

"To take them back with us. And what an honor it shall be. It's not every day that my partner would grant an audience to such a pokemon."

Quill didn't know exactly what this guy was up to, but it didn't sound like it was something good. Still against so many of them, it was best to try the diplomatic approach before rushing into a battle.

"Is there any way I can convince you to leave?" Quill asked. "Surely finding this pokemon isn't worth your trouble."

Houndoom wagged his tail in a way that told Quill he was starting to get annoyed. "How right you are. I said the same thing nearly word for word. Such mediocre tasks are unfitting for my level of ability. However, it was a request made by my partner; I can't refuse something like that. Now if you really want to get me to leave sooner, you'll tell me where Vine City is. I hear the pokemon we're looking for is currently living there. How about it then?" Quill got down on all four and flared up the spots on his neck and back. Houndoom smiled as if amused by his sudden aggression. "You don't seriously mean to fight me. I get it. You must be a resident of Vine City. Well then, I'll just have to force the information out of you."

The other Houndoom all stood up and backed away from their leader as far as they could. No doubt they were used to seeing the destruction his attacks could cause.

Quill dug beneath the ground in an attempt to sneak up on him, but Houndoom wasn't having any of it. He dug out a small amount of the ground and exhaled a Smog into the earth. It seeped through the cracks in the loosely packed rocks, reaching Quill down in the tunnel he had burrowed. He coughed fiercely and struggled to get to the surface as quickly as possible. Once out of the ground, Quill pulled a Pecha berry out of his bag.

"Oh no you don't!" Houndoom swatted the berry out of his hand with a well aimed swipe of the tail that sent it flying into the forest below. "Eat all the berries you want after you tell me where this Vine City is."

"I'll never tell you…" Quill swayed a little from the poison, but managed to attack with Swift.

Houndoom's eyes widened as he unleashed his attack. The force of the dark energy he emanated made it seem like he radiated fear. Quill stood frozen in place from fear and watched as the attack stopped his own and threw it back at him with what must have been double the force. Quill was hit directly and nearly thrown over the edge of the cliff. He managed to keep a hold of the ground to keep from being thrown over the edge, but he was so badly hurt just from the one attack that he couldn't stand.

"Is that all?" Houndoom walked towards Quill slowly. "Don't be a hero; tell me where the city is or I'll throw you over the edge."

Quill refused to say a word. He was done talking with this guy. Houndoom walked towards him at the same slow pace until he was so close that if Quill could move he could have reached out and touched one of his claws.

Houndoom lifted a paw slowly, threatening to swipe Quill off of the edge of the cliff. He held it in the air for a moment in an attempt to intimidate Quill before swiping at him. A blue streak appeared at Houndoom's left and latched onto his paw. Houndoom swatted his paw in the opposite direction and knocked his attacker into the stone wall. The pokemon screamed as they hit the wall so hard that it left a huge dent and fell to the ground.

"Daisy!" Quill shouted. "What do you think you're doing here?"

"I-I was worried…" She managed to say. "You seemed nervous about this mission, which is really weird for you, so I wanted to come help you."

"Oh how cute." Houndoom said. "Unfortunately for you, I never liked cute. How about this? You tell me where Vine City is or I'll knock this kid over the edge instead!"

"No!" Quill shouted. "Don't hurt her! She can't even control her fire fully yet! This battle is between us. If you knock anyone off the cliff, then let it be me!"

"You don't make the conditions here, I do. Now it's in your best interest to start cooperating!"

Quill tensed up. What was he supposed to do? He couldn't let Daisy get hurt, but he couldn't endanger anyone in the city either. Whoever it was that this Houndoom was looking for must have been really important.

Houndoom smirked and turned towards Daisy. Immediately his smile faded. "Huh, well it looks like I don't need your cooperation anyway. The person we were looking for has come to find us on their own."

"What?" Quill said. "You can't mean Daisy! What do you want with her?"

"I wouldn't know. My partner was fairly specific though. Look for the Cyndaquil that lives in the forest. By his information, there's only one in this forest. Now that we've found her, I'll leave as you asked."

Houndoom walked over to Daisy. At the last minute she tried to run, but he caught her easily and held her in his jaws tightly enough to keep her from slipping away, but not so much that it would hurt her. Daisy tried to flare up the fire on her back, but all that she could make were small sparks.

Houndoom's pendant started to glow a sinister red color and the ridge started to shake. In the side of the stone wall, a huge fissure opened. All of the smaller Houndoom ran inside of it and vanished. Houndoom waited for them to depart before walking into the fissure himself.

Quill finally managed to reach his bag and pulled out a Pecha berry. Eating it managed to give him back some of his strength that had faded from the poison. In front of him, the fissure started to close again. Quill ran towards it and jumped inside just as the fissure sealed shut.

For a moment he was falling through an empty blank expanse. It didn't last long, however. The next second he had hit the ground. Only instead of it being the bottom of some sort of ravine, he was suddenly in the middle of a forest clearing. How had he fallen into the side of the cliff and ended up back in the forest?

He looked up hoping to see the cliff above him, but it was nowhere to be seen and the trees were so tall here that he couldn't figure out what direction they were in. After a minute he realized that something wasn't right. The air felt warmer than it had been and the air smelled completely different. Judging by the smell, this wasn't Sylva at all. Wherever he was, he had never encountered air that smelled this way before.

Though it was dark, he was just barely able to make out his surroundings. He was in some sort of garden in the middle of the forest. Stepping stones wound through the garden so that people could navigate through it without stepping on the plants. At the far end was a large lake ringed by large stones. In the center of the lake was a tree with the roots split right above water level. Inside the tree, something started to glow faintly.

"You… Who are you?" a voice asked him inside his head. Quill had heard telepathic messages before, but it had been so long that the voice startled him. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to scare you."

The light emerged from the tree roots and floated around the boughs of the tree before hovering towards Quill and stopping right in front of him. At first it was too bright to make out the source of the light. Soon his eyes adjusted and he was able to make out the pokemon in the light.

It was a pokemon that he had never seen before. Its ears were V shaped and were orange, as were its hands. The rest of its body was a cream color with wings on its lower back. The pokemon had one fang that was larger than the other that stuck out under its upper lip like the Houndoom's fangs had done. Its dark blue eyes looked like they were almost the exact color of the night sky.

"Who are you?" Quill asked.

"Isn't that what I asked you? Yes sir, I think it is." The pokemon asked. It was hard to tell, but Quill assumed it was a male. "Well, it doesn't matter. Since you were able to find this place, I assume you're of a pure heart. Only the pure hearted can find their way to the Hidden Grove while I'm at full strength. And guess what? I am right now, yes sir. So again, who are you? I'll tell you my name if you tell me yours."

"My name's Quill." Quill said. "I came here following a giant Houndoom that kidnapped my sister."

"Giant Houndoom. Ooh he's no good. Best to stay away from him, yes sir. Well never mind that for now. You're looking pretty pitiful. Best you stay here and heal for a while. I take it you're not from around here."

"No, I don't think so…" Quill said. "Honestly, I'm not even sure I'm in the same world anymore."

"Ah, I see. Well, my name's Victini, yes sir. Let me be the first to welcome you to the country of Dellevis."