Riolu stirred and slowly opened his eyes, mildly disappointed to be dragged out of his sleep before he felt he'd had enough of it, but reminded of the whole reason he and the other two Pokémon – one an old friend, and the other new – were here, he quickly got over it.
He nudged Popplio. "Hey, buddy, it's time to get up."
Popplio's eyes fluttered open and he yawned cutely. "Hi, Riolu…" He looked to the side to see Alesia still sleeping. He lay his fin on her and shook her lightly.
Alesia woke up, the fin brushing her as she stood up. She snappily grew alarmed, and examined herself all over. Her face faltered. She hadn't dreamt any of it; she really had gotten turned into an Eevee.
'And here I was hoping maybe she was just trolling us…' Riolu started to climb the stairs leading out of their pit. "Come on, guys, let's prepare for our first day."
"Welcome to the Kecleon Shop!" the Kecleon running said shop greeted Popplio and Alesia.
"Hi!" Popplio greeted amicably. He checked the list Riolu had given him. "Can we get three Oran Berries, a Tiny Reviver Seed, and a Blast Seed?"
Kecleon gathered the requested items and placed them on the counter. "That comes to 262 Poké!"
Popplio paid the money. "Thanks, and bye!" he excused himself and Alesia while putting the items in the satchel.
"Goodbye, and thank you for your custom!" Kecleon called after them.
"Geez, you'd expect him to be worried I might steal from his shop," Alesia remarked quietly to Popplio.
"Maybe he knows you didn't do it!" Popplio suggested cheerily.
A short time after, Riolu came out of the Braviary court house. "Okay, guys, I got the paperwork filled out, and the three of us are now all officially-recognized as a R.E.E.D. team." He was holding three peculiar-looking trinkets – a white base with a transparent four-point star rotated to the position of the letter X, with another four-point star on top of it, transparent just like the one underneath it, but rotated to the position of a plus symbol. He gave one of each to Popplio and Alesia and kept one for himself, according to the names engraved on the back of each. "Those are our badges! They teleport us and other Pokémon out of dungeons and back home, and they go up in rank the more missions we complete. And a little something to help us out…" He produced three pieces of cloth and knotted one around his neck, and gave one of each to Popplio and Alesia. "A Power Band for me, a Special Band for Popplio, and a Joy Ribbon for you, Alesia."
Riolu's scarf was vermilion with a single yellow star with eight points, while Popplio's scarf was blue with a a symbol of a small circle with two rings around it, a much lighter and paler shade of blue, which appeared to be white at first glance. Alesia's garment was white with cyan polka dots. Popplio's eyes glistened, absolutely enamored with his scarf around his neck and its colors, while Alesia gave hers no more than, "Neat."
"Now let's go choose something from the bulletin board," Riolu suggested, pointing at the board with papers pinned to it.
"Hold on." Alesia had suddenly remembered something. "I can't go. Braviary said I couldn't and I don't want to get into an even bigger mess."
"Not without permission," Riolu specified. "I got that all cleared up, and it's fine for you to leave for work."
"Wait!"
Alesia, Popplio, and Riolu all heard a voice that the first two had been talking to shortly before. "You are in search of a mission?"
Kecleon scurried over, looked behind him at his stall to make sure no one was emptying the stock or the money chest, then looked back at Team Everlasting. "My brother went to Rusted Complex two days ago but hasn't returned yet. Please, you will help, will you not?"
"No worries, we'll go get him back and that'll be our first job as an official team!" Popplio promised. "Right, guys?"
Riolu smiled. "Sure, why not?"
"Okay," said Alesia unsurely, wishing she knew what Rusted Complex was.
"Oh, thank you dearly!" Kecleon gushed, and kissed Alesia on the paw and Popplio on the fin, but Riolu lifted his paw away before he could receive the same treatment.
"The 'thank you' is enough for us," Riolu told him pointedly, despite Popplio's appreciation of the gesture. Alesia, however, was suitably weirded out just like her Fighting-type teammate.
"I have a handsome reward prepared for your success!" Kecleon added, and returned to his stall.
"We ready to leave now?" asked Riolu.
"I'm up for it!" cheered Popplio.
But a thought had crossed Alesia's mind. "I don't know how to battle. How can I do anything?"
"That's true." Riolu ruminated on that for a moment. "I got it! We can go to Wobbuffet Dojo and see if the Wobbuffet inside might help train you." 'Can't help but wonder why he wasn't in court yesterday, though…'
Inside Wobbuffet Dojo, it appeared to be empty in the main room. It had a door that led to who knew where, but it would be rude to enter uninvited.
There was no need to, because the door swung open with the arrival of… a Gallade?
"Hello?" Riolu greeted.
"Hi," said Gallade, seeing that these Pokémon were new. A pause went by before he continued: "I suppose I'd better explain things just to break any potential awkwardness. My grandfather was a Wobbuffet who owned this dojo before me, and his will prevents the name or appearance from being altered."
"...I guess that makes sense?" Alesia figured.
"Now then," Gallade addressed them, "can I help you? Do you want to train?"
"Well, I guess that's kinda right," Riolu began. "See, our new pal Alesia here," he and Popplio stepped behind Alesia, leaving her in front of them, "She doesn't know how to do any battling. We're going on a mission to Rusted Complex to go save Kecleon's brother, and we were wondering if you," although he'd had a Wobbuffet in mind before seeing Gallade, making his use of "you" not entirely accurate, "would be able to accompany us and help her out, if it's not too much trouble?"
"Sure."
Alesia seemed happy. "You will?"
"I haven't been getting many wishing to train," Gallade admitted. "That, plus this'll give me an excuse to get out for a while. You can only spend so much time in a place as small as this, y'know?"
"Then it's settled." Riolu held up his badge. "We'll all save Kecleon together!"
"Yeah! We will!" Popplio held his badge up next to Popplio's.
They both smiled at Alesia invitingly. She returned the smile and put her badge next to theirs, happy to humor them. "To Team Everlasting!"
The group set out, and as they walked, the quiet village hidden in trees seemed impossible to return to if they didn't have a trusty map.
"What's Rusted Complex?" asked Alesia, hoping at least some of them knew.
"It's an abandoned factory built by humans when they used to exist," Gallade explained. "But no one's seen them for hundreds of years."
Popplio pointed up at the sky. A flock of flying Pokémon soared high above. "They're delivering the mail!"
"What?" Alesia seemed perplexed. She quickly clarified, "I know what mail is. I just don't know why the fact that those Pokémon are there means that we're getting mail."
"Those Pelipper are based at R.E.E.D. HQ," Gallade begun as they all resumed moving. "The envelopes they're carrying in their beaks contain jobs for R.E.E.D. teams to take on. Braviary must have gotten in touch with them to say our village now needs deliveries since we have a team." He looked back down. "So, what moves do you kids have?"
Popplio beamed. "Moonblast! Water Gun!"
"Really?" Gallade seemed surprised. Alesia didn't, because, again, her memory was scrambled, meaning she wouldn't have a much of an understanding of how Pokémon moves worked.
"Riolu and I learnt some cool moves a while ago! He knows Force Palm and Focus Blast!"
"You seem to have put a lot of work into forming your own team," Gallade remarked, with respect for their dedication.
"Not me," said Alesia. "I'm new, and… I… I don't know what moves I have." She considered adding that she had amnesia, but decided to keep the details scant. She didn't exactly have loose lips about her former species, after all.
Her desire to conserve time turned out to be for the better, because the walk to their destination tired them all out, but her in particular. She had not been ready for this in the slightest. Riolu and Popplio at least had the advantage of having prepared for their work and the effort it entailed, and in Gallade's case, he was simply bigger and therefore more physically capable.
"I'm sure you can at least Tackle," Gallade pointed out. "Why don't you try it on me?" He stopped walking and spread his arms out.
Alesia halted. "Are you sure?" she asked, as Riolu and Popplio did the same and looked back at her.
"Sure. There's no better time to learn."
Alesia slowly stepped back a bit, then ran forward. She jumped into the air, reducing her momentum, as if trying to take back the jump, while turning her head to the side and closing her eyes. She felt herself collide with Gallade and fall to the ground.
Gallade shook his head in disappointment. "You're perfectly capable of doing more, but you're holding back." They all resumed their long walk, passing rocks and shrubbery. The yellow path on the ground was no longer present, but they still knew where to go thanks to the map.
By now, the grass beneath them was longer and darker. Alesia sat down, feeling she deserved a break from all that walking and the toll it had put on her poor feet. "Is this the place?" she asked, as she and Gallade followed Riolu and Popplio.
"According to the map it is." Riolu didn't initially look up from the map that had come with their team kit, but now, he folded it back up, put it back in Popplio's (one had also been included in the team kit, but Popplio did not want to get rid of the one he already had), and overlooked the new area. It appeared to be a brick building, about six stories high, represented by twelve windows in two columns on each side.
The tarnished aluminum roof hosted vines which hung down over the moss-coated walls. The pattern the windows were arranged in was completely ignored by the unpredictable placements of broken glass. What all the windows had in common, however, was that they were impossible to see through as a result of not having been cleaned for years on end.
Alesia tilted her head as she gazed upon the building. "So you're saying humans used to live in this world a long time ago, but now they don't, and they built this when they were here?" With what she knew of this Pokémon world, the construct in front of them seemed rather out of place, although it made more sense when she kept in mind the context that humans had existed several centuries before and this was a creation of theirs. She'd never thought it possible for something to look both normal and bizarre simultaneously.
With indistinct mumbling sounds, Gallade nodded. "There are apparently some places like it in the Air Continent." He was reminded of a Porygon who had come to the Ice Continent for tourism purposes, and befriended Gallade during a conversation about a hangout place from back home, which it had described as a decrepit lab of some sort.
"Are those on the map too?" Alesia asked.
"Nope," Riolu told her. "Our map is only of the Ice Continent. Now let's take a look inside."
Since the door into the factory had been designed for human use, the handle was too high for any of the three team members to open. Gallade obliged, being most suited for the job due to his height and bipedal stature. With some effort, he pulled the door slowly, and released it when there was enough space for them all to enter.
Riolu and Popplio entered, and Gallade went after them. They noticed Alesia was still outside, resting on the ground, her fur blocking the blades of grass from annoyingly tickling her skin. "Uh… aren't you going to come in?" asked Riolu, a bit condescendingly.
"I'm… well…" Alesia gulped. "The Kecleon said his brother came here but didn't come home. Doesn't that get you wondering what's inside?"
"Go home and give your badge back to Braviary if you don't want to do your job," Riolu snarked.
"No! Please don't do that!" Popplio didn't like the idea of their new friend leaving them. "We'll all battle anything and everything in there!"
Alesia looked up and rose to her feet, and hesitantly entered the disused, run-down building.
On the inside, it was, of course, suddenly much darker, the only source of light being the ajar doorway. The metallic floor felt cold beneath them, and they were nervous to even take a step for fear they might step on something sharp and possibly contaminated.
Popplio clapped his fins together. It took the lights overhead on the ceiling a fair bit of flickering, but after that, they finally turned on good and proper, illuminating the ongoing corridor. The windows were tall, narrow, and vertically rectangular. Patches of rust were on the wall with varying shapes and sizes.
"Well… that sure worked wonders…" Alesia stated unsurely, taking a few steps to the side when she heard a creaking noise above her and feared something might fall. "So are we ready to–"
Before she could finish, the chain holding a light to the ceiling snapped right above Popplio, who rolled to the side just in time to avoid it. The light was crushed by the floor putting an end to the falling object's velocity, separating the metal cone where it had been fastened by bolts and smashing the glass bulb.
Allowing the sudden gut-punch in her stomach to subside, Alesia cleared her throat. "As I was saying… are we ready to leave?"
"Yep," said Riolu. "Let's split up, gang. Popplio and I will go through that door, Alesia and Gallade can take the other one. You'll keep her safe, won't you, Gallade?"
"Of course," Gallade assured. "What kind of dojo owner would I be if I didn't?"
"If you find Kecleon, tell us using your badge." To provide an example, Riolu held the badge close to his mouth and made sure to clearly say, "Alesia." Both his and Alesia's badges suddenly started glowing. "Do you copy?" he asked, his voice audible from Alesia's badge.
"Clear!" Alesia said into her own badge, and heard it being said from Riolu's badge a few yards away.
"Good. Riolu out." The shining light from both badges faded away. "We'll meet you guys later!" Riolu entered one of the two opposing doorways and began a hike up the staircase, at which Popplio followed him.
"Listen, um," said Alesia to Gallade. "You don't need to protect me from absolutely everything. I'll still try to battle whatever I can." She couldn't see herself going far in this world if she didn't do anything for herself.
"Very good." Gallade nodded. "But I won't abandon you if you're in dire need of assistance."
"Thanks a bunch," Alesia replied appreciatively. "So, I guess now we take that other doorway."
In the center of the new room was a cylinder with red glass on top, opaque just like the windows on the sides of the building. Alesia guessed that operation of the machine, whatever its purpose, had been done via the control panels in the four edges of the square room, with use of the various levers and buttons.
"Wonder if there are any feral Pokémon in here," asked Gallade as he and Alesia finished ascending the stairs to enter a room just as brightly-lit as the downstairs floor.
Alesia wondered about the implications of this, and realized that this would mean that not all Pokémon in this world were on the same level of sapience as humans, and that some were just like the Pokémon back home, but of course, she had to be careful with questioning it lest she hint at her true origin. "You mean like the Golbat in Ambient Cave?"
"Yeah, like that." Gallade nodded. "They don't like their home being invaded."
'So that explains why they chased us out,' Alesia realized as she started scanning the room, far too out of scale for her now that she was an Eevee and this place had originally been constructed by humans, and spotted a gear-like object sticking out from a hole in the ceiling. "A Klinklang?"
Upon hearing its species name, the correctly-guessed Klinklang descended from the hole in the ceiling and floated toward Alesia. Ordinarily, it would have been no big deal, but in her new form, the Klinklang greatly outsized her, causing her to step back in fear.
'Okay, what can I do… oh, yeah! Maybe I have Swift!' She concentrated hard, doing what she thought Pokémon did to use this particular move, and it… actually worked. Golden outlines of stars shot out from the forcefield of energy around her, and hit the Klinklang, knocking it down.
At least for a moment. More enraged than ever, it employed a Thundershock on Alesia, who, upon being struck by the light yellow bolt, feeling as if she'd been impaled lengthwise from head to tail, flickered between being a normal opaque Eevee and having her skeleton visible to the outside as if she were being viewed through an X-ray, for a few seconds before she fell to the ground. "Owowow…"
Gallade intervened by using a Low Sweep to send the Klinklang flying into the wall. It fell down to the ground, but did not get up.
"Come on," Gallade told Alesia, ushering her to the staircase all the way over on the other side of the room. "We have to get out of here before it wakes up."
"But what about Kecleon?" asked Alesia as they went up.
"We'll search for him on the other floors, and come back if we haven't found him after that." Gallade and Alesia emerged from the other end of the staircase.
The new room seemed to be an observatory, with one of the wide, tall walls made entirely of glass. Several cabinets were propped up. It looked like this room was for watching experiments taking place outside that wouldn't have been safe to do inside, such as those involving explosives.
Alesia made the mistake of walking a little too close to the wall, and was scratched by a patch of brown rust. She winced and gave a silent, sharp exhale of pain.
She cautiously took a step forward… and was confronted by an Elekid that hastily popped out from behind a shelf.
It bowed its head down and charged at Alesia, getting her stuck in between its two horns. She shrieked and thrashed about, trying to break free of it.
"Don't help me!" she told Gallade as she attempted to maintain a shred of dignity. "I can take care of this guy!"
Gallade stood on the sidelines, watching her attempt to break free. He was perfectly willing to help, but since she had requested to be left to handle the matter herself, presumably to gain valuable experience from the ordeal that would help her fight future opponents, he stayed put. Alesia thrust her back legs into the air and sent them flying down into the Elekid's face, prompting it to grab her, yank her out of its horns, and toss her aside. She got up, her expression burning with promise of retribution, which came in the form of her charging toward it and tackling it to send it flying a few feet, and for her final act, she used a Swift, each star causing it to give a small cry of pain. It looked as though it was going to get back up, but its eyes then closed.
Noticing that this had made Alesia wince, Gallade kneeled down and checked its pulse. "Don't worry, you haven't killed it," he told her, applying a joking tone. "Nice work!"
Alesia felt proud. "Thanks!"
"Off we go! I bet you'll have no problem handling whatever's on the next floor."
She grinned as she scrambled up the stairs, newly-imbued with tenaciousness.
The next floor was small and compact, with crates littered around, some tipped over with their contents spilled all over the floor, necessitating careful steps. After the previous two floors, Alesia knew better than to assume this meant it really was unoccupied save for herself and Gallade… but even after taking a detailed glance of the room, nothing came to attack them.
Alesia wondered what could be inside the crates. She placed her rather long ear next to one, wondering if any Pokémon could be inside; if there were, they could only be small, and thus easy for her to fend off like she had done the Elekid. She heard nothing, so knocked on the side. Still absent any other sound, Alesia decided to open the box, and found… several scarves and a pair of sunglasses.
"What are these doing here?" she asked, puzzled, taking out the contents.
"Nice find!" Gallade complimented. "These are like the scarves you and your teammates have equipped. That Joy Ribbon of yours, for example."
"Do you want any?" asked Alesia. "We don't need all of them, and it was nice of you to come all the way over here with us."
"Well… alright." Gallade considered the options, and picked one out. "I'll take this Twist Band."
Just then, Alesia's badge began to glow. "Alesia! We found Kecleon!" came Riolu's voice. "Where are you?"
Alesia spent a couple seconds remembering how many staircases they had climbed, and thus what floor they were on in relation to the rest of the building. "Floor 4, counting the entrance."
"We're on Floor 5 on the side Popplio and I took."
"Okay, we'll meet you there. Alesia out." The badge stopped glowing. "The other staircase!" She and Gallade chose the staircase that led to the other side of the building.
"We're here!" Alesia announced as she ran to Riolu and Popplio, with Gallade running after her.
"You made it!" cheered Riolu. Alesia could tell that unlike Riolu's rather sarcastic "Great" yesterday when she had told him she was getting the hang of walking, his congratulations were legitimate.
"We sure did! And look what we found." She showed him the scarves and the glasses.
"An Insomniscope! Nice." Riolu took the glasses and wore them. "'Sup, baby?"
Popplio and Gallade found it quite entertaining, but Alesia begged to differ, and held her face in her paw. "Please just stop…"
"Well... okay. Guess I have to, anyway." Having reverted to his usual demeanor, Riolu removed the shades. "Multiple ability-enhancing items don't work, only one at a time. Kecleon's up there, by the way." He pointed up at a rather high, blocky steel platform, on top of which was a purple Kecleon, green where a Kecleon's default form would be yellow. The platform was inside a black pit in the ground, blocked off by railing to prevent anyone from falling in. There were balconies higher up in the room parallel to each other, and on the ground was machinery that controlled how high the platform would go. Obviously no one could see it, but at the bottom of the chasm where the platform touched the floor, rust that had built up over centuries locked the platform in its current position.
"What?" Gallade noticed the lack of a staircase. "How did he get up there?"
Kecleon pointed up at a hole in the ceiling. Judging by the irregular shape and jagged edges, it wasn't supposed to be there and had ended up there as a result of some kind of extreme damage.
"He fell from the top floor," Riolu said.
But now there was the question of how Kecleon could get down. It would be unsafe from him to jump down from the platform to the floor.
"I got it!" Popplio proclaimed. "We can make a chain from the hole in the ceiling and pull him up."
Riolu judged the distance between the platform and the ceiling and compared it to the combined heights of him, Popplio, Alesia, and Gallade. "Yeah, that would work."
So they turned around… but only managed to take a few steps back to the staircase before there were pounding noises from behind them. They turned around to see a gleaming – almost blindingly so – creature with a hexagon on its torso (in the middle of which there was a round hole), giant thick hexagons for shoulders, spheres for fists, and a phenomenally-smaller black sphere for what could be its eye. Alesia shivered and whimpered at the presence of the titan and hid behind her teammates.
"You dare intrude the home of the mighty Melmetal?!" thundered the creature, apparently naming itself.
"You're right, we do!" Riolu fired back. "We know you're holding Kecleon hostage here!"
Melmetal paused. "Who?"
So Melmetal hadn't kidnapped Kecleon after all, supposedly. From the looks of things, it hadn't even realized his presence. "Never mind that. We're still gonna get him back!"
The quartet legged it (except for Popplio, who dragged himself along the floor using his fins) to the doorway… but Melmetal beat them to it and blocked their way out. "Not so fast!" it boomed. "No one who intrudes my home shall live to tell the tale! I am the lifeforce that rules this home, and I'll deal with your friend up there once I've disposed of all of you!"
"Melmetal! No, whoever you are!" declared Popplio with anger Alesia had thought uncharacteristic of him. "For the sake of the Kecleon brothers, we, Team Everlasting, will strike you down!"
Determined to help protect the newly-formed team, Gallade jumped up and struck Melmetal with Close Combat, hitting it with his fists as many times as he could before Melmetal used Flash Cannon to send him flying off, leaving a trail of blinding light in his wake. Popplio fired a Bubblebeam while Riolu used Focus Blast, but the stream of rapidfire bubbles and the explosion of light only had the chance to do minimal damage before Melmetal swept the two Pokémon off the ground with Thunder Punch. As the electrified, enormous fist struck them, they cried out in pain from both the brute force and the electricity, laying down on the floor, temporarily unable to move.
Alesia was able to overcome her former intimidation and use Swift, the onslaught of bright stars adding to the damage the others had already done. She attempted to evade a Thunderbolt, but wasn't quite fast enough and felt the power coursing through her body.
"Take this!" Riolu zoomed forward through the air with his fist exposed, and Melmetal felt Force Palm being slammed into it.
"And this!" Alesia added, aiming her Swift before opening fire.
"And another one of these!" Gallade returned to mercilessly striking Melmetal with Cross Chop.
"And that!" Popplio chimed in, getting the pronoun wrong before using Moonblast. A pink sphere of light shot through the air, knocking Melmetal back a couple of meters.
Melmetal seemed weakened a fair amount, evident by its struggle to get up and attack. It managed to do so eventually, and hit everyone (sans Kecleon) with a Thunderbolt. While the other three were able to collect themselves, Popplio lay on the ground, completely devoid of energy.
Seeing this, Alesia turned around.
"Alesia! Where are you going? We have to defeat this thing!" Gallade told Alesia, who appeared to be skipping town.
Alesia stopped running when she reached Popplio's satchel, which had been blown away. "Popplio needs help!" She rummaged through the satchel, then grabbed the sole Tiny Reviver Seed from it, remembering the name and figuring it must be for this purpose, and held it to Popplio's nose.
Popplio slowly bit it, then ate the entire thing, and sprung up. "Thank you, Alesia!"
They both ran to resume assisting Riolu and Gallade, both currently engaged in a combination attack. Melmetal's attacks caused massive damage, but the group still managed to fight, and would not let their resolve waver. The final nail in the coffin for Melmetal was Gallade's Cross Chop, at which point Melmetal gently wobbled around in place for a few seconds before he collapsed, forcing the four fighters to get out of its way so they didn't get crushed.
"We… we did it!" Riolu seemed more overjoyed than he ever had in Alesia's short time of knowing him. "We defeated it!"
"We couldn't have done it without you, Gallade," Alesia said to the dojo owner, giving credit where credit was due.
"It's my job to ensure as many Pokémon as possible can be good fighters to keep our future looking bright," Gallade assured the three smaller Pokémon. "Now let's go help Kecleon."
"Brother!" Now that the purple Kecleon had returned to Izolo Village, the green Kecleon pulled him into a hug. "How wonderful to have you back!"
They turned to address the four Pokémon. "You all have our unending gratitude," the green Kecleon informed them, and produced several coins. "750 Poké! Counted it myself."
"Go ahead," Riolu told Gallade. "Take your share of the reward."
So Gallade accepted 100 Poké from the total. "This'll be enough, thank you very much. I'm sure the rest of you can make use of this if you need supplies for your work."
"No additional complimentary items?" asked the purple Kecleon. "Anything you like!"
"Nothing else for me, thanks," Gallade said modestly. "'Twas an honor to assist. I must return home. Take care, everyone, and be the best fighters you can."
"Goodbye, and thank you!" Team Everlasting and the Kecleon brothers called after him as he left.
Riolu turned his attention back to the shop to take the brothers up on their offer. "Well… wouldn't wanna take too much so you guys don't go bust… but we'll have a Reviver Seed, a Blast Seed, and a Sitrus Berry."
"Done!" The green Kecleon put the items on the counter. "You're all our favorite customers!"
"That's us!" Popplio said proudly.
"Thanks a lot." Riolu placed the new items into the satchel. "Bye!"
"That was AWESOME!" Popplio was still giddy about their success today. "We totally beat that big mean guy and saved Kecleon!"
"Still though, the three of us will need to handle the work by ourselves from now on," Riolu pointed out, his new Insomniscope next to him. "Thankfully, I doubt we'll be encountering too many Melmetal. Today was just a fluke."
"Oh, thank heavens." Alesia slumped over her bed. "I don't know how many of those I can take in one lifetime."
"But on the plus side, we got a ton of points for our mission," Riolu mentioned.
"Points? What are those?" Alesia enquired.
"When we successfully complete a mission, we get points which make our Team Rank go up."
"That's right!" said Popplio. "We're gonna get a really high scoe!"
"It's called a 'score', Popplio." Riolu turned over. "Anyways, I'm up for a good night's sleep if you are."
Alesia yawned. "Yeah, I know how that is…" She got back into a sleeping position. "Goodnight, you guys."
A/N (02/25/2019): This chapter has been reworked with added descriptions of the interior of Rusted Complex and what moves actually look like, a new segment of the journey to Rusted Complex, and attempts to convey the differences in personality between the three team members thanks to an in-depth, detailed review I received from cynsh. I thank him greatly for his time and attention. Feel free to check out the Pokemon Mystery Dungeon Writers United Forum; we have a Discord server.