Yeaaaayyy, let's actually go on a mission~!
Virizion: Well, it is still the beginning of the novel. So there's no wonder why you hadn't begun a mission prior.

Me: :I Hweh, I know... Agh. You're making me look boring.

Chapter 7: Serving our Union

A tight corridor hugs our forms as we make our way throughout the darkened Mystery Dungeon.

Our first, really. Our first time as part of... of Paradise, to be in one of these forsaken jails where the enemies spawn on loops that never break or end and cries for help from a single pokemon are all that concern us. It's nice, working alongside these other characters who I know actually... care. They care about the target's safety as well as I do.

At the moment, my head swivels around- catches sight of our teammates. I've found myself entangled in here with Elijah's dark face watching me over and Virizion's elegant step careful ahead and Bay's playful tromp following slovenly. Zoey's talking-to with Burr never seemed to end and last I heard, she was loafing around at Mary's Inn, continuing to converse with the brown-furred timburr.

We are trying to save a wooly mammal with tusks branching off of his face: called a piloswine, if I am not mistaken. The snout-esque being sent a message for help via the swanna at Post Town's inn which our small group now found ourselves searching for- him. I don't recall his name, but an appearance.

I run into a wall of hair, and glance upwards. A pink snout. A pinksnout stares back at me. Dark, beady eyes eventually sift into his hairy face.

A squeal.

"Wait, what do we do now..?" mumbles Bay, his cyan-lined irises expanding slowly in sight of the piloswine. I... I know we're supposed to escort him out from the Mystery Dungeon. We need to find a way to take him home.

Virizion takes yield. "Aye, we must escort him out of here, in order to save him... which is a task I believe we all want to work on."

It is a quite short and silent notion, to stride along back to the entrance, taking the hairy mass of a piloswine along with us. He follows dutifully alongside our somewhat-icy group. I still speak as little as possible and often not as Virizion attempts to stifle the tension with empty words of conversation.

We need to work on adjusting to one another even more than saving pokemon.
I should try to talk more if we want to be a team...

It is not until early dawn of another morning that I can work myself up to try and speak this time around, as I wake and am unfortunate enough to see that my new-found partner is a semi-descent early riser.

Droplets slip onto my narrow nose. I let out a small sneeze, glancing up from the wooden opening. I look up at a white paw, dripping with water. A blue mammal is attached to the arm. She stares at me for a quiet moment, dumbfounded. "Oh! So you're awake already!" Zoey's river blue eyes sparkle. "Come on, Virizion just slipped outta her room after what sounded like talking to someone out her window! What if she was lying when she said she didn't have a boyfriend?" She doesn't have a boyfriend..? I guess I missed that part in her idle conversation that strolled along outside of the dungeon... sorry, Virizion...

Upon leaving our small but snug home, Virizion's purple eyes alight at our entrance into her small gathering totaling in not one, but also another furry biped. They each display their own shades of silent what-could-be happiness.

Tim is silent again, but his companion immediately belts out the words: "Dudes! Gurdurr's letting us in on your team! I mean, we're already helping out and building this thing up, but now, bros, now we've got the permission to, like, go out in Mystery Dungeons and stuff!"

His companion's dark eyes shine subtly. I expect he will be happy to join our odd little troop as well.

At this, the waterlogged mammal beside me spurts out a shrill, high-pitched squeal that spins and swirls in my cut holes of ears. "YesyesyesyesyesyesyesYEEEESSSSSSSSS!" She proceeds to bounce about in circles before ramming at the timburr members and shaking one of each of their hands wildly, like a sort of whip. "This is too cool! So awesome! Aaaahhhhgg! I'm... just... yes, please! Yes, yes, yes!"
Noticing her levels of ecstatic energy must be too high to find any sort of reason stored within, I opt to explain, if not using the smallest amount of words I possibly can. "There's no sign up... so... you're in..." It's simple to break in and pretend to join, but then again, it would be easy to determine which pokemon are serious about helping and which don't care. I think Tim, even if silent, does so. It's obvious to tell where Burr's excitement is going, so I need not bat an eye at him as I had for his companion.

A gruff tone bursts into my team-like thinking. "Sup, 'mates?" I'll never get used to all of these creatures working together. I flinch back from the voice until realizing that it's just Gurdurr, his gray-furred and muscular arms wrapped tightly about some oddly-mixed items that I could only assume are what he's working with to make Paradise such a... paradise. "Tim; Burr; be sure to scout out for different items we could use to rebuild this dump. Make it all nice like that house there." He smirks, but it's a lively and playful one resulting from the knowledge that he built the nice house there. He built it with his own strength and power and fuel. Himself. And he wants to go on, too. "So look out while you're there."

The larger biped nods before moving off again in preparation of another orange landscape to be renewed. As he leaves, a ball of watery fur emerges with a small, brown sack draped over her little frame. "Hey, Llana! Mary told me about this other rescue team that needs help finding their way out after some crazy incident... I think it was in this Forest... yeah. Forest Grotto. So we gotta search that place out like heck and then... like, save them. Also, I got a bag for us to keep stuff in!" Brown fabric hits my scales with a satisfying rrrrrrrrrrrip. Others follow in a similar fashion. "Got some more, too, just in case. Gosh, that swanna is stocked up. So... let's go on our first trip!"
"Actually, Zoey, we already took a trip." Virizion smiles lightly to the younger character. "Had to save a piloswine we'd heard about in Hazy Pass... well, no matter!" She raises her head and nods firmly. "You should be happy to join us on our next one."
"Well... it's still my first one..." the childish oshawott grumbles to herself, pouting to a childish factor nearing ridicule. She eventually shakes off the look and runs along up to us, tugging one of the bags off the grass in front of my still-unmoved self. I think that teams attract unwanted attention when they explore in larger groups, but I don't even have to turn around and tell any other pokemon that they can't join us as the majority have already roamed around in search of whatever's taken their interest. Only Burr remains, bright blue orbs palpably watching the bag as it bounces in Zoey's wet hand prints.

"Hey, it'd be my first too!"
And with that, our team has sorted itself out. Apparently I'm joining up for another rescue attempt. Not that I actually mind... what would I do if I wasn't so close up here? Would I look for Elijah or Bay..? I guess I could have...

I obediently follow Virision's slightly swishing green tail for a failing attempt keep up with her long legs. The cottony notion of fluffy feet stomping alert me of the rest of our team behind. We travel through the light green grass. I turn my head from side to side, watching the mountains of differencing colors pass by around us. I notice how some mountains are noticeably standing out: straight, a varying shade of deep gray, no openings but footholds and ledges. Those are actual mountains, not taken over by the strange aura of Mystery Dungeons. I also notice the slight change in size of looming mountains and their hunching features, almost like broken-backed beings in a multifarious of coloring, as we near the thick, domed entrance with a gaping hole stuck mid-gape in the front. Only Mystery Dungeons open up... so... willingly to swallow us in.

Once we are in range of entering the Mystery Dungeon, I feel a surge of adrenaline face me. Before the others start to move, I throw myself in front of the line and swerve into the hollow area. I notice how though Forest Grotto is made by rocks, a forest nearly consumes it. The boulder part of the opening gapes out at me, but wooden pillars almost block me from entering. I weave past the tree trunks and shove myself within the large hole. Rustling noises alert me of teammates approaching.

The Mystery Dungeon holds an alluring composure- shady structure, almost knitted together by shadows. I notice its openings in rock and decide that we must climb upwards to find the top in order to, well, save that other rescue team. Hanging bits of moss and lichen wave like detached limbs on the walls, possibly the reason this place is a "forest" in the name. The vegetation clumps and swallows rocks, emitting a natural green. Spots of sunlight shine on the ground, but it only offers higher-quality lighting in bits and to point out how many shadows actually exist in this grotto. The majority of this place shines of stone, or of shrubbery-eaten stone, for that matter, though the occasional lake sucks in land from points.

I hang back, letting the others of my team travel first. Virizion brushes past me immediately. A natural leader, she seems. I leap toward the elegant one- a not graceful order, nearly smacking into her tail again. My pale feet tremble as I move near the green quadrupled as she enters a chosen hallway. The walls have pelts of lichen, the plant touching me as I struggle through. After leading into a new opening, the plant quality doubles back, leaving open, gray space. In the room, pillars face us like pokemon.

Rustling moments and steals of whispers signals a return for of our members. A few rushed moments pass, and no sound. I glance up at Virizion's cream face. Her purple eyes flash back at me, thoughtful. "I'm sure they will show up soon," the legendary says, wrinkling her nose in distaste, "so let's try to move on anyways." And so I shrug, not wanting to take as leader, and follow her long, pretty fur up the pillars. When our faces break to the top, the Mystery Dungeon has jumbled as we take higher. And I know that somewhere inside the clutches of magic, Zoey searches within. I can only wonder what she has found, alongside with Burr.

Hands clenched, I convince myself not to grab at Virizion's pelt, not even if this air stiffens at me. The quadrupled legendary moves through a carpet of moss so easily. I cringe at the thought of diving my feet within what could be lurking inside, but it's not like I'd ditch her, even if I hardly... well... know her. My feet stand on rugged tips as I scramble out of the swishing ground. Monstrous depths of choking, rancid fear clog my chest. Nonetheless, my feet twitch after I climb out of the clinging pieces. But I hear an unmistakable rustle, rustle from within the confines of the moss. Shaky lips grasp for breath that stills about us.

The creature suddenly bursts like its own little explosion as its lithe and fiery red maw snatches my tail and I'm flung to the side and side and side and swoosh swoosh swoosh swooshwooshwooshwooshwooshwooshwoosh. It spins around with no axis and takes me along until I plunge into the grass alone and pure pokemon instinct commands vines to draw and lash out at the being behind me.

The vines breach through my curved, yellow shoulders. My whip like weapons claw at the enemy and eventually, the green pieces just so tie around the narrow creature's body. A thud announces the enemy falling. I repeat this technique thorough until the body is transparent. Unable to be grasped. I slowly turn around to watch the frame of a small, long creature with numerous legs dissolves into the magic of the Mystery Dungeon. The webbing strapped to my tail also melts into thin air. I gasp. These effects are so... real. It's hard to imagine, at times, how this each flows.

Footsteps. I detect the large, clumsy ones and loud, awkward slithering. Yet another accompanies the pairs I recognize. It is thumping, but slow and cautious. The steps become garbled, as if the characters grew too close together and fumbled. Soon, a light blue head brandishes from the hall of a corridor I had passed not too long ago. It looks the same as the other rooms, dull and placid. But the small, light blue head is of an enemy. Silver braids slip down her face, covering a pair of luminous, soft orange eyes. Her nose is circular and large, taking a portion of her light blue face. She has a thin frame, and long legs. Her hands are small and light blue, also.

The bagon, I realize, is a female. And will not be permitted to battling my teammates. Not when I catch it. My vines spring from yellow shoulders, shooting at the hungry, poor dragonet. I will finish her quickly. Before my vines reach the target, a flash of yellow scales intercepts the attack. Instead, my vines latch around none other than a wet, mangled ball. I shriek, tossing her to the ground frantically and flattening myself against the wall. Mind racing, I take in deep breaths in an attempt to calm myself. Zoey... why... why do you even..?

"..You.. l-lll-lLlana?" A shaky voice. The small, light dragonet faces me, her gaze wavering. "Z-Zoey sa..aid th-that you.. are h-her friend." She blinks, her small paws clenched with fear. "A..are you?" The voice cracks awkwardly at the end. To assure the small bagon, I quietly nod. She gets the message. "..I...I'm J-jen," she stutters on. I nod slowly, and blink to her, not talking. "A..are yy-y-you dd-eaf?" She squeaks, orange eyes widening.

I squeak in mareepishness. "No..." I whisper. I await for the light blue bipedal to make a move, when she doesn't... "Hello, Jen. Call me... Llana..."
"I... like... y-yyour... vvv...vvvoice."
"I get that a lot..."

Instead, I get a loud scream. "Llana! There you are!" Beige bag wrapped around her entire body, bouncing along dutifully, the waterlogged, blue bipedal finally recovers and jumps at me. Her white fingers dig painfully into my arm, but I attempt to ignore the spike of hurt. "Did you meet Jen? Huh, huh? She's our new recruit!" I blink softly. Wait, but... recruit? We have those..? We... oh... uh... "Yeah! You remember Bay and Elijah and Virizion and Burr and Tim? Meet Jen!" So now that makes... another teammate.

Burr stumbles into the room as if he's taken a swig of the drink Gurdurr had held so dearly before Hazy Pass and all that we've gone through. He'd completely annihilated any use of it. "Hey guyyy...yyyee... oww..." He crumples into a boulder lying below him.

"Oh yeah. We found a fletchling somewhere around here. Stupid fire bird started singing or something..? Well, then Burr got all twisted and stuff." Zoey giggles, accent shining through. Jen is still, not even her silvery braids swishing any longer.

From the corridor a legendary had disappeared into, she reappears now. Her cream face ducks out of the doorway at me. Her gaze sharply watches our whole group, and the quadrupled shrugs thoughtfully. "...I found them in a room smelling and looking of explosion. Dust and debris and stains lie everywhere... The smell was absolutely putrid." Virizion takes the lead, and some new creatures follow her unsteadily.

The bravest one, a yellow quadrupled with nipped little ears and a lightning bolt tail follows her easily with a charm to his gaze. "Zest the pikachu," Zoey whispers in awe. Slowly, a flaming orange mammal crawls from the corridor. His brown snout snorts a steady flame, but his gaze wavers over our group. "Blazing the pignite." Her squeaky voice giggles. Finally, a small, sickly green dragonet rushes past me, the large tooth in his mouth nearly slicing me. I shiver, not seeing much of the character's design but not particularly caring. "And... Swift the axew!" The oshawott squeals, lightly tugging on her long, blue ears along with my arm. "Aaaaaaaghhhhhhh... they're all heeeeerrreeeeeee..." I guess this is what to expect of her first time going on a rescue session. To display a loony sense of lost and overflow by joy in every last sight. "Oohhhh boooyyyyyyyyyy... ahahaaa..."

We make a quick exit through the Mystery Dungeon. After receiving an assortment of long, spiky vines Burr somehow managed to unearth in his state, our team heads back to our pokemon Paradise. I carefully clasp the vines by the edges, not wanting to be poked. I keep my attention to the long inanimate items as time flows by. Before I know it, I have delivered the sturdy vines and found Jen a home for Paradise. Currently, as Tim works dutifully along the lines of the house, she was forced into the position of sleeping in the same hay bed as Zoey. The bagon didn't seem to mind, although. Zoey has a bright spirit nestled in her wet personality.

Paradise is adjusting to me well.

Throughout the night, I lie in a deep slumber until morning rises through the earliest of dawn, light flowing throughout the horizon like a threaded material. The colors barely reach into the chain of dark, but still flash upon me. I quietly part my jaws for a yawn and stretch. I slip out of the wooden house, a light breeze cooling me.

Steadily traipsing about the Paradise, I note the addition of plodded fields and numerous stretches of seeds lying within the soil. If I recognize these well enough, the area will surely contain rows of oran berries, was it? I recall when I was nigh unconscious and Zoey forced the blue, succulent crop in my mouth, somehow restoring every last weakened nerve in my body and allowing me to regain such strength that I could even stand and move... Those will... come in handy, I know. I've heard that the crop grows quickly as well. How... helpful...

"I didn't know you were up this early." The dark and low tone cuts through me, entering in my ears and drowning me from the outside in, soaking and singeing my being as my cheeks suddenly stain and eyes unceremoniously widen and my body stilts on edge. "The swanna told me about a vaporeon... you know, one of those finned beings, in need of help nearby." She did, then... I was going to visit her- ask about a quest. And yet here I am now with the dark-furred and dark-eyed timburr to my back, my entity stilted on edge and ears ringing and breath almost flung to the side like an afterthought. Like living has become an afterthought, almost... "Care to join me, Llana?"
Somehow I find the nerve in me to nod repeatedly, feverishly, as the blood in my cheeks washes out on its own. "...Come along, then."

And so I turn around to face his glinting, dark-eyed watch. I don't know whether I feel protected or... threatened, by him. I truly cannot tell much about Tim besides his... well... "You're quite short, you know that?" Wait, he's... addressing me.
Oh, um... "You're not so... er... um... t-tall... yourself, I daresay." He blinks, as if surprised I commented at all, much less that I teased. Or tried to.

"Indubitably, Llana... indubitably." A snort.
I can't help myself and find an odd compulsion to continue. "Indubitably indeed." It's almost like a joke, to toss that word around Paradise so freely. Indubitably. We will indubitably try as hard as we can to grow in the short time remaining before whatever darkness could come out. And so, this thought tucked safely in my mind, I stride on beside the dark and tall figure beside me as we make our way to the Mystery Dungeon the finned quadrupedal we're supposed to be saving... is supposed to reside.

The sun slugmaishly climbs the sky, slowly illuminating through the dark. Mountain Pass unveils rows of jagged chunks of rock to the ceiling. Stalactites hand precariously onto the ceiling, unmoving, but chipped thoroughly. The gnarled rock digs into the pale scales on my reptilian feet; I have to bite my lip to keep quiet. Ignore the acrid tang of blood as I keep the noises inside. The narrow passage dislodges under my foot, unbalancing me. In a flash Tim is by my side, his fingers clenched onto my arms to keep me from falling. It's an easy lift to tow me in toward safety again. His toss is simple... somewhat as if I'm luggage. Sorry, Tim...

The sun is high in the horizon. The dark has hidden- to be here again tonight. Tim stops my walking, slightly poking my curved, yellow shoulder. I glance to the left, where a cowering, light blue creature is curled up. It has webbed ears and toes. A strong tail. A shiny, wet body. We have found the weakened vaporeon, reduced from its usual healthy, feline state to a shivering sack of bones. Its sea green eyes sparkle in hope to spot us. That was unceremoniously simple, saying how we found no enemies whatsoever to further dislodge me from my disposition.

Before we take the treacherous journey back, Tim leans onto the ground. He scoops out a handful of soil from the shallow dip with his shadowy gray fingers. It's soil, he's collecting... Gurdurr did say that supplies were appreciated.

I snap to work, tugging out small holds of dirt and carefully storing it within the pouch hanging on my shoulder. Our hands quickly mix into the mucky color. But we are fueled by a plan. Soon after the digging, I accompany the lost vaporeon, Tim taking in the front of our ragged group.

The water type saved, and our return to Paradise final, I pile our amount of dirt carefully into a large mass. Slowly, in laborious work, the shadowy timburr and the scrawny, pale snivy -me- smooth the dirt. We compact the dark matter, melting it into a long form. The pile of dirt softly flattens into a field. For planting. After smoothing out a mucky pile, I gather a small, blue berry from our bag. And push it within the dirt. Another, for good measure. I helped here, too...

Paw steps thrum against the rich soil just smoothed on the ground. The silky smooth fur on an animal's body floods against me as it loses its grip. I slip onto the dirt. My eyes wide open, I watch the character. The white quadrupled. Her purple eyes strained on me. A billowing mane covering her snowy white nose. "Oh, sorry Llana," she murmurs with a hint of a royal accent, mixed with her soothing tone that I've heard many times. Her accent oddly reminds me of Zoey's now- almost completely opposing.

But I know this lady.

I know her.

"S-Stella?!"

Me: Yeeeeess.. now you must turn the page. Why? HANG OF THE CLIFF!

Stella: Starry, you don't know that~

Me: Are you trying to inflate your oversized ego too?

Zoey: :3 Hwehweh.

Stella: Oh it's that thingy.

Zoey: I AM A THINGY?

Stella: YES.

Me: DOUBLE YES.

Zoey: TTwTT