The wooden boards creaked ominously underneath my feet.
"You're sure this place is safe to stand on?" I asked, not able to keep all of the nervousness from my voice. The bearded man next to me simply laughed.
"People manage to live here for years, I don't think your scrawny girls weight's gonna be what tips it over." I scowled at him, sticking to the center of the path as I slowly started to walk out on what apparently passed as a main street in Pacifidlog Town. The town, for lack of a better word, was situated entirely on wooden rafts floating in the middle of the ocean.
My two cents: this is freaking insane. According to the travel guide I'd been handed, it was estimated Pacifidlog drifts as much as 600 metres a year, slowly making circles around the same general area of Route 132 as the tides swirled. We were right in the middle of the deepest blue I'd ever seen, the ocean stretching out to the horizon in all directions. The small houses were all made of different woods, and the ocean freely splashed and spilled over some of the pathways, small planks that served as connecting bridges. There wasn't a single car or bike in the town, all transport done on foot. For these reasons Pacifidlog was considered one of the greatest tourism sites in Hoenn, a marvel of the natural and human worlds meeting, and has ranked #4 in a list of places to visit before you die.
These reasons were also why I found it horribly terrifying.
I let out Claire, my shellder, giving her the chance to stretch. I figured she'd like it being so close to the water, and she could help me out if I fell into the ocean.
"Shell shell!" She seemed excited, by the way she was spinning around in the water.
"Oh yeah, you haven't seen the ocean in a long time, huh?" I tickled the underside of her shell, remembering. The last time would have been a few years ago, when my family took a trip to Lilycove. I only had Zane and Claire back then, and had spent most of the time playing on the beach. Thinking about my parents made my mood turn dark again. "Anyway, stay close by, okay!"
"Der!" Claire called out, as she rapidly swam away excitedly chasing a corsola, completely ignoring my request.
I continued along the path, walking maybe just a little slower than I would have been on solid land. I asked for directions to my next case at the pokemon centre, paranoid they'd find out I wasn't a real trainer and arrest me the entire time. I had a trainer ID, sure, but what if they found out I was with Team Magma somehow? Granted, I hadn't done anything worth going to jail yet. In my three or so weeks with the gang things had actually been… a little boring.
Deliver this package, go with this group to mass capture more pokemon for the team. One battle with some Team Aqua members, which had been kind of cool even though I didn't understand why we were fighting, and had acted mostly as support since we outnumbered them three to one at the time. My own feelings on the subject puzzled me. When I'd nervously joined the recruitment rally I'd been realistic; I hadn't actually been expecting to be sent out straight away to assassinate foreign dignities and blow up buildings, which would lead to complex moral decisions I had to agonize over which resulted in me ditching the team at the last minute to save a bus full of small children, preferably on live TV in front of some hot girls... except I totally had been hoping for that. Expectations were a dangerous and sucky thing.
After my uneventful trip to the pokemon centre I was told to head for a small building painted all in pastel colours. Naturally, it was at the edge of town, and I had plenty of time to think on my way there.
"Shel shellder?" Claire had decided to come back, and turned her head (well, her whole body) in a quizzical look at me.
"I haven't told you why we're here, have I?" The purple clam pokemon bounced out of the water, agreeing as she splashed me. Well, I think she was agreeing; I sometimes had trouble reading my pokemon's expressions without Zane acting as psychic translator. Something to work on later. "Apparently there's a lady here with a pokemon that knows every single pokemon move," I announced dramatically.
"… ellder?" Claire looked lost. I tugged on her tongue, grabbing her attention.
"Hey, as in one pokemon that knows all fire moves, as well as electric moves, and water ones-"
"Shellder! Shell shell!" At the mention of water moves she sounded impressed and started reacting, swimming in frantic circles.
"Uhh, yeah. Which is why it sounds pretty cool! I mean, it could be another dead-end, but I'm not exactly rich with mysteries to pick from, and who knows-" At some point Claire had stopped listening again, and was now looping around me. Swimming backwards she would go under the wooden pathway I was on, then reappear on the surface on the other side, before leaping over me with a splash and starting all over again. "You're getting me wet, y'know!" She only giggled and continued, making me question my worth as a trainer. Fortunately, her attention span saved me from embarrassing myself in public, Claire darting off the moment she saw some seaweed drift below. Reaching my destination, I knocked on the door of the house. It was more of a hut from the outside, really.
The wait that followed was painful. I had based my whole trip out here on a small article in a couple newspapers, which really wasn't a lot to go on. Despite my best efforts (hours on the internet looking for paranormal things worth investigating), it turned out mysteries really didn't just advertise themselves as such. What if this turned out to be another bogus case? I managed to work myself up as I went over what I knew. One: there was some kind of eco-fight going on in town, and this woman was here to help. Two: she had a pokemon that claimed to know every technique ever known, of all seventeen elements. That was pretty cool, and couldn't be natural. It wasn't a smeargle or anything either, it was some Kanto pokemon, so it just had to be a special case. As I racked my brain trying to remember what it was, the door was opened by a pink plush toy of a pokemon with a colourful scarf around its head.
"Clefable, fable!" It- she?- beckoned for me to follow, so I did. I was lead into an airy kitchen with a round table, at which a woman in her forties was sitting.
"Hello there, can I help you?" She barely looked up from her book as she greeted me.
"My name's Neal, I was ah, wondering if I could ask you some questions about your pokemon?" I hadn't expected her to look like such a… non-trainer. She was a little cold looking, but professionally-dressed; she could be an accountant or someone in real estate. If you looked closely you could see small streaks of white beginning to invade her hair.
"Ah, are you from the paper? Here for an interview already, I see." Her whole demeanor changed, rising to greet me warmly, forcing me into a chair as she got out glasses. "Is juice okay?"
"Uh, yes please." Well, I hadn't lied on purpose, I just wasn't correcting her on the newspaper thing… whatever got her to talk about that clefable, I guess. "Is it true you have a pokemon that knows every known move?"
"It certainly is. My name's Miranda Edgecombe, by the way, with an 'e' at the end," she replied, giving me my drink as she settled back across from me. I leaned forward unconsciously, eager for info on her pokemon. "Have you heard of a move called metronome?" My hopes sank faster than a golem in the ocean. It must have been visible on my face, since she laughed. "No no, I can see what you're thinking. But rest assured, my little Mimi," she patted her clefable absentmindedly as she talked, "can do much more than a regular metronome. I can proudly say she's mastered the move to a degree no other pokemon has. Shall I show you?"
"Yes please! It's not that I don't believe you, but well"-
"That's quite all right. A visual demonstration makes for much more exciting news than just listening to little old me talk about her, yes? Release your pokemon if you'd like, and follow me." She got up, leading her pink puffball by the hand like a child. Claire was still out swimming somewhere, so I only released Zane as we walked. Miranda burst into laughter at the sight of him.
"Oh my! It's a little tepig on a spring! Where do you Hoenn people find these things?"
"Hey, that's Zane, my spoink!" I stepped forward protectively, offended. I mean sure, spoink weren't exactly 'cool' pokemon… or strong-looking… or known for much… but still, that was just rude!
"I'm sorry, I shouldn't have let my expressions show like that," she said, reserved mask back on. That wasn't exactly why I was offended, but it was close enough to an apology. I chewed on the ice cubes in my drink to avoid saying anything back. "This is a spoink, right?"
"I certainly am," Zane answered, voice neutral.
"Oh! A psychic type, of course. Is it true your heart stops beating when you stop bouncing up and down like that?" It was all I could do not to roll my eyes. She leaned forward, inspecting my pokemon.
"That's an urban myth, actually, Mythbusters covered it once," I told her, used to this. "Zane can last a few hours sitting still without any long-term side effects, his heart rate only slows down when he's still. He still needs to bounce, but a spoink sat still for five hours on the show and was healthy, if really weak afterwards. Most foreign pokedexes still get that wrong." I left out the embarrassing part where Zane and I hadn't known any of that either, until we'd seen the show ourselves.
"I see!" Miranda continued making a fuss over Zane, giving me the impression she hadn't seen many Hoenn pokemon. I was right- she'd stayed in the Unova and Kanto regions her whole life, and was currently only renting this house as she stayed to deal with some kind of corsola migration problem. How did we get stuck talking about my pokemon and her life story? It took a while until I managed to swing the conversation back to her clefable- man that woman could talk. But finally we made it to her 'backyard'- this being Pacifidlog town it was a large wooden balcony overlooking the ocean.
Mimi walked ahead of us, lifted a finger to the sky, waggled it and shot out a brilliant beam of ice. While doing the move she lifted her other paw, a thin jet of flames meeting it in the sky. The two met with a boom, before she broke apart the smoke with a razor leaf attack. Then a thunderbolt, then a dark pulse of some kind, before she shot rocks out of nowhere, the gigantic boulders landing into the water like cannon balls. Each time Miranda announced the attack beforehand, Mimi following without hesitation.
"How'd you do it?" I asked, amazed. Normal metronomes selected an attack at random, with the pokemon powerless to decide what attack shot out. This was different.
"That's simple: through years of training me and Mimi have unlocked the secret to the move metronome. Have any requests for her?" I chose a few moves at random, but after a psychic and leaf blade I already believed what she was saying. The pink puffball was calm, and didn't even seem taxed by all the different moves.
"So is this something any pokemon could learn to do, one day?" I queried, totally not thinking of getting a pokemon with metronome for myself.
"I highly doubt it," she laughed. "Mimi here has been my only pokemon for years, and was already gifted when I got her. It's not something that could be achieved in a few months." Damn. Mimi and Zane had a mock battle, but Mimi used bug and dark moves for the advantage, like I'd expected, so I called it off rather soon. I tried pressing Miranda further but she refused to give me specific details on how they'd managed such a feat, simply inviting me to watch her display tomorrow at some protest in town if I wanted to see more of her pokemon. I wasn't going to give up yet, but agreed to leave then for fear of getting on her bad side.
That night in the pokemon centre I couldn't sleep, thinking. I had a real mystery here, someone who had figured out one of the secrets of the pokemon world, but I had no clue how they'd managed it. I tried searching the internet for Miranda and her puffball, but found nothing. Fortunately I'd managed to get a room to myself, the town hardly a large city, so my two pokemon bar Hunter had room to sleep out of their pokeballs and were relaxing.
"Any ideas on what makes her clefable special?" I asked Zane, both of us lying on my bed in the dark.
"Only one thing stood out, but I don't think it is anything," he admitted.
"Well let's hear it anyway."
"She is too calm… she reminds me of the dark one." I flopped my face into my pillow.
"Please don't remind me about Hunter... What are we gonna do about him guys?" When I'd signed up for Team Magma I'd been given him, to make sure my team met their standards.
"I do not like him," Zane replied bluntly.
"Shell shell!" Claire looked up from the couch she was investigating, nodding enthusiastically.
"You just don't like him because he's a dark pokemon," I pointed accusingly at Zane.
"There is more to it that that!" Helooked up at me with indignation. "He refuses to talk about himself or participate in anything other than battles. He is an ill-fit for our family. He is also named after the ghost pokemon haunter, hardly a good omen." I gave Zane a look. Wait, what was that last part? I was pretty sure he was just named Hunter because it sounded tough to the magma grunts who raised him, it being similar to 'haunter' was just a coincidence.
"Uhh, Zane? You know not all pokemon are named after other species of pokemon, right?"
"But many are, such as myself." Shit, he wasn't joking. How to explain to him that nobody actually did that? I'd only named Zane after a zangoose when I was an idiot kid. That was awkward.
"No, I'm pretty sure Hunter wasn't. Uh, just out of curiosity, what do you think Claire was named after?" I gestured at my shellder, who stuck out her tongue at him.
"It is for her future evolution as a cloyster, correct? The beginning of Clair and cloyster are the same." He sounded proud that he'd figured that out, and for a pokemon that couldn't read I guess that was some pretty good wordplay. But no, damnit, pokemon weren't named after other pokemon, he was the exception here. But if I told Zane that it'd be tantamount to telling him his name was dumb (which really, the reasoning behind it was). I let the matter drop, rolling over on the bed.
"Anyway… it's not Hunter's fault he was raised in a pokemon training camp-thing. Most Team Magma pokemon are... I guess they were pretty strict on him. But that's no reason not to play with him or share food, got it?" I tried to sound stern, so the other two in front of me wouldn't hear the doubts in my own mind. I released Hunter after that, inviting the mightyena to sleep on my bed. He shook his head once for a no and curled up below the window instead, watching me with calm eyes.
But for all my words about making him part of the family, I still had trouble sleeping with the dark pokemon in my room that night. There was something strange about suddenly being given a pokemon so strong, especially one that never showed emotion outside of battle. What did he think about? Did he have dreams of his own, or friends from before we'd met? Every time I asked him Hunter had simply told Zane 'I know my place' and clammed up tighter than Claire ever could.
Ever since I'd had a nightmare about him attacking me in my sleep, me powerless to stop him, I'd realized I don't really trust the pooch like I do my other two pokemon. I'd have to do something about our relationship, but tonight was not that night. Man, it was too stressful and distracting right now, I should have been wide awake coming up with a plan for Miranda and her Mimi! 'Mimi'. Even her pokemon's name was self-centered- in person Miranda was all 'me me' all the time. It might have been because I was half asleep, but I remember thinking that was significant for some reason.
The next day, early in the afternoon.
"Where did all these people come from?" I cried out, surprised.
"From their homes, most likely," replied my smart-ass of a partner. I was talking about the surprisingly large crowd building up in Pacifidlog, filling the main streets right up to the waters edge. My lack of sleep last night had resulted in me sleeping in almost until noon, and barely making it in time to the main square where the protests were being held. A quick spray of deodorant and an energy drink was practically the same as a shower and healthy breakfast, right?
From what I gathered, the corsola- a pink coral pokemon that had water and rock abilities- were having issues which affected the town. I wasn't sure if Pacifidlog was built on a corsola colony, or simply alongside one, but either way their migration junk and in-fighting among families had caused leaks in some houses, and some people were in favour of getting rid of them all. Way harsh. Then again, if all the houses in my town were in danger of sinking at any moment, I'd probably be worried too. Like any good issue with no clear right or wrong side, the town had split in two and was busy yelling at each other instead of doing something about it.
At a rough guess the crowd was split between people whose jobs and lifestyles depended on Pacifidlog staying as it was with the corsola- the mayor, fisherman, tourism people from cafes and hotels- and the townspeople who put their safety first made up the rest. A few 'activists' were pumping up the crowd, encouraging people to voice their concerns, unfortunately.
"We should relocate the corsola colony east! They don't deserve to suffer!"
"Oh yeah? And who's going to pay for that?"
"They're just wild pokemon, kill a few and they'll all swim off to bother another town!"
"You can't kill pokemon because you chose to live on their nest! Corsola are classed as semi-endangered in the national listings! They stay here, and we should move!"
I'd heard enough. Thankfully, all the townspeople started to shut up when Miranda came forward with the mayor. He announced her suggested plan of scaring off the stronger of the corsola with her clefable Mimi, so that the colony would calm down and things would revert back to normal around here. She was mostly encouraged by the skeptical crowd, but I soon found out why no one had actually been doing anything directly against the pokemon: there was a lot of corsola under the floating town. And I mean a lot.
We watched in relative quiet as Mimi froze a patch of water and landed on it gracefully, oversized scarf blowing in the wind. Then, far enough out she could see under the planks of the town, she began launching seed bombs and leech seed attacks into the water. The grass moves made sense- with the dual advantage against both of corsolas weaknesses they were easy pickings. But within a few minutes Mimi's lone icy platform was surrounded by the pink coral pokemon, dozens of them shooting out bubblebeams and rock blasts and spikes from their backs as they tried to knock her off.
"Cor, cor!" they chanted, several of them launching a group power gem combo that Mimi barely dodged by leaping into the air with a flying-type move.
"Don't fear for my baby!" declared Miranda, tone confident. "This skirmish is nothing to her. Heal with aqua ring, girl!" The clefable obliged, the water surrounding her not only soothing her injuries but also absorbing any further water attacks from the colony. I had to admit, that was pretty smart battling. She continued to fend off the crowd for a little longer, using vine whips to separate them and ice moves to trap them under the ice when they started climbing out of the water. She was also pretty quick, dodging water attacks nimbly and leaping over rock attacks. But battling smart only did so much, and against numbers like these she needed much more raw power. I noticed even with the grass moves Mimi wasn't knocking any of them out in one hit, which was a problem. I readied Zane and Claire by my side, just in case.
"Are you sure you don't want back-up? She doesn't have to do this alone!" I called over the murmur, but Miranda just scoffed and ignored my offer. The townspeople seemed impressed, muttering to themselves as they realized her clefable really could control metronome, and more to the point was taking on a whole colony by herself. Everyone along the waterline had phones out, taking pictures and video as Mimi wowed them. The tide of corsola seemed to finally be slowing down, Mimi knocking back several with a surf as her solar beam picked them off at a distance. The battle wasn't really a safe distance away from town, but no one had been hit yet so no one seemed to mind. I'd just started believing she might be able to do this, impressed despite myself, when one of them got lucky with a rock blast and knocked off Mimi's scarf.
Then it all went to hell.
Mimi reached out for it with a panicked grab, the fabric drifting away on the water's surface.
"Fable! Fay fay!" she squeaked, starting to cry.
"Mimi, what have I told you? You can battle just fine without that thing!" Miranda's tone was sharp, and a little strange. I glanced uneasily at the woman, unable to read her expression behind her large sunglasses.
"Cleffa, clefable!"
"I don't care, metronome and finish these things off! I can get you a new one after!" Mimi looked downcast, but tried another metronome, shooting a scarlet flamethrower at one of the closest corsola. The attack was useless, the fire turning harmlessly into steam as it hit the water.
Zane cackled next to me, "Well well, this just got interesting, didn't it?" When the steam cleared Mimi was in serious trouble, three corsola crowding her on the ice platform. She knocked one back into the water with a double slap, but two more took its place.
"No! Mimi, only use your metronome, this display has to be perfect!" I was seriously starting to dislike Miranda, I decided.
"Fay fay!" Mimi squeaked, and to her obvious reluctance, she used metronome again. Some kind of ground-based move shot out from her feet, stunning the corsola but also tearing apart her icy battle stage like a knife through warm butter. "Fable!" she cried as she fell into the water amongst chunks of ice.
I turned to her trainer. "NOW can we help? She obviously can't control metronome!" I didn't wait for a response, addressing my pokemon. "Claire, okay, clam shut, head down, get in there and get out. Save her!"
"Shell shell!" She dived into the water at once as I spun to Zane.
"Confuse rays into the water?" he guessed.
"Yep, buy her as much time as possible." Zane started firing ahead, confusing as many of the corsola in Claire's path as he could. But it was difficult to tell if they would be in time- the sea where Mimi had been standing moments ago was now churning from the frenzied battle under the surface. Corsola were tackling and butting her around, taking advantage now that they had the speed advantage in the water. To her credit, it looked like Mimi was still trying metronome- once all of the corsola flew back from something, another time nothing seemed to happen, and on her third attempt electricity lit up the whole section of the water they were in. Claire was fortunately still far away enough not to have been blasted with the electricity, or I would have been pissed. As it was I yelled at Miranda: "Tell her to stop doing that already!"
"I'm sorry we're not all perfect trainers like you, brat!" she snarled, suddenly losing her composure. What the hell? I wasn't the one who'd bragged and claimed I had a pokemon that had mastered every move. I could abuse her later, right now we needed to focus saving her pokemon.
"Could you just get her pokeball out? She looks hurt, we're gonna need to return her as soon as she's close enough." I checked and saw my shellder speeding our way now, a bleeding clefable holding onto her back just above the surface as water sprayed around them in their wake. The corsola were following, still enraged from the attack on their home, but were being held back for now. I noticed Zane had switched to psybeams for actual damage, the psychic blasts joined by streams of light and ice from fellow trainer's pokemon alongside me. Looking up with relief I saw two trainers release a large swampert and a pelipper to join Claire on the water's edge, fighting corsola off while we unloaded Mimi. She was breathing heavily, but wasn't missing any vital parts and was still conscious.
"We did it!" I cheered, sitting down on the wood with a thump. I left it for the other trainers to calm down the remaining aggressive corsola, the ones that insisted on still fighting. I was just too beat from all the emotion to help out, and really wished I'd eaten a proper breakfast now. Needed to get my sleeping pattern on track so I didn't keep missing a meal before stuff like this.
"Happy now?" Miranda sniffed, giving me a glare that any seviper would be proud of.
"Not really, no," I replied dryly. "I was kind of hoping you were the real deal, not a con artist who risked her pokemon's life to look important." Another con artist, I resisted myself from adding.
"I am the real deal! Mimi knows every move you can think of, she just- just needs a little help still." Her voice started to crack on that last part, finally sounding human. The pokemon in question had been returned, and had been whisked away by a nurse from the pokemon centre.
Calling them hadn't even crossed my mind- I'm glad I wasn't the only trainer out here. The crowd started to disperse, some rounding on the mayor and activists behind us once more, others keeping their distance from the battles or simply bored now that the show was over. After the worst of the hecklers had left her alone, I somehow found myself waiting in the pokemon centre alongside the middle-aged woman, alone in the sterile corridor as we waited to hear about Mimi. I wasn't sure how it had come to that, and wasn't sure what to say to her.
She spoke first, breaking the silence. "That scarf cost me a fortune, you know."
"What was it?" I couldn't keep the weariness from my voice.
"There's an item called a choice scarf, it boosts your pokemon's speed but limits their attacks." I vaguely recalled what she was talking about- the choice items boost a pokemon's speed or defensive or other abilities, but were better used on a pokemon with claws or fangs, since they could only do regular swipes and bite attacks while they were on. Pokemon that relied on shooting flames or electricity or other special moves in battle could only use one attack with them while wearing the item- the negatives far outweighed the positives in my mind, and it was a gimmicky way to fight.
"I know of them, yeah. But what's that got to do with Mimi?" I asked, frowning.
"I… I knit two of the scarves together, boosting its effect." That explained why it was oversized, I guess. "Then…"
"Then what? You could be in trouble for gross negligence unless you can prove you thought she could actually handle all of those corsola," I reminded her bluntly. Officer Jenny's words seemed to do the trick, and she started talking again. But honestly, I realized I didn't care much about her motives or what would happen to this woman, I just wanted to know how they'd done it. I was barely listening as she spoke, head down, about being a failed pokemon trainer in her youth. The husband that left her, the urge to be successful at something as she realized her life was already past its prime.
Finally she got to Mimi, and their discovery that she could sort of influence metronome's random attacks when she worked at it. I hadn't seen much of that today, but then she had been panicking after the scarf flew off. Miranda had combined the choice scarf's ability with electric shock training, the kind they used in labs to prompt ratata to run through mazes. It sounded cruel and barbaric and I couldn't keep the look of disgust off my face as she elaborated.
Her clefable was shocked for every metronome that wasn't exactly what she wanted, even though the point of the move was to be random and unpredictable. Eventually Mimi was able to use over a hundred moves, though she had to memorize each one individually, and it sounded like a long, painful process. And then they were going to tour Hoenn, wowing people with their powers and Miranda making a name for herself as a celebrity. This had been their first port of call.
"But… why not just catch a smeargle? They can already learn most moves, with the right training. There's no need for all of that." I couldn't get my head around what she'd done- it all seemed so pointless and convulted.
"More effort, and boring." If the look she gave me could talk, it'd be sneering 'you're such a child' right about now. "A smeargle that knows a variety of moves wouldn't make me famous, all of them are like that" she sniffed. I could have torn my hair out in frustration. She'd practically tortured her only pokemon just to get on the cover of magazines? She didn't care if Mimi was happy, and didn't even care about getting stronger like a real trainer. This was all just to make headlines and impress people. I couldn't understand her at all. I got up and left her in the waiting room mid-speech.
"Oh, and by the way, I'm not a reporter," I told her flatly on the way out. I spoke to the nurses, telling them everything she'd told me on my way out. I was so done with Pacifidlog town, I hoped I never had to set foot on its weird wooden streets again. I returned to the mainland on a ferry that afternoon, dreading my next Team Magma mission with a heavy heart. I'd reasoned it was worth being in the gang if I got to find real mysteries, to get stronger and save people, but so far all I'd found was two shams.
Sure, she had been able to use every move I could think of, but at what cost? I was hardly going to tell everyone about Miranda's methods and hope they could all learn from her example. I sighed against the railing of the boat, not looking back as the town disappeared in the distance. Zane nudged my leg with his paw.
"At least you saved the pokemon this time." I grinned weakly at him, not really comforted but thankful anyway.
"You think there are mysteries out there? Real ones?"
"You'll find them. It just takes time to get better at it." Done reassuring me, Zane bounced off to find food. I hoped he was right, unconvinced. Maybe all mysteries were just scams people hadn't caught out yet.
As aimless as my life felt right then, I'd have been relieved to know the next mystery I encountered was most definitely real. What wouldn't relieve me was when it turned out to be so real it stole one of my teammate's lives away from me.
A/N: And chapter four is here! Poor Neal, two scams in a row. What are the odds he'll take that to heart and consider giving up on mysteries? Granted, that would make this a pretty short series if he really did give up. The next chapter's finally gonna have another proper mystery for him, but at what cost? Ooh, and we finally get another main character, look forward to it!