"Thank you, thank you, thank you so much for rescuing me!"

Standing next to the bulletin board in the Paradise Center (what Quagsire had dubbed the portion of Paradise west of the river-bridge next to your house, including his shop and the Request Counter), you face the two new faces of the day. Dunsparce, having collected himself from the earlier tear-letting, is flooding you with gratefulness. Emolga stands next to him, patting his back. Dunsparce looks like a giant pancake in his natural position, you notice.

Quagsire watches all four of you without a word. He seems to be amused, but you can never tell, because he's always amused. Azumarill has already taken off for the day. A true adventurer should only set out at the crack of dawn, she says.

"Oh, right, your reward!" Dunsparce squeaks. "Sorry, sorry, I forgot all about it!" Then, to Emolga, "Hey, I forgot the reward at home, do you have anything for them?"

Emolga sighs. "What would you do without me? I knew you'd forget, so I went to your house and got them for you. Here," She turns to face Jen, and takes things out of a regular leather bag. "A Blast Seed, a Red Key, and the money we promised."

"Thank you, but we don't really need-"

"Spare me the dramatics," Emolga says. "Please, take it. You still need to sustain yourselves."

"Emolga... is right..." Quagsire adds. "What they want to give... you should accept..."

"Yeah!" Emolga says, a mischievous grin showing her teeth. "Just take it, you dummies!"

After the two of you finally give in, Quagsire beams. "Well... you two succesfully completed... your first request... that's wonderful... now... you deserve... some rest..." He waves, and waddles away. "See you two... tomorrow..."

Beside you, you hear Emolga, worried. "I'm glad we found you this time, but you've got to stop being so reckless, Dunsparce."

The Pokemon in question whimpers. "I know. It's just that... you know. I just really want to be the one rescuing, for once."

"That's something you can do if you try."

"But I'm not strong enough! And I get afraid so easily. And I always lose my nerve just when it counts. And I'm always messing up everything for everyone. And then everyone has to come and rescue me. I'm sorry for always dragging you into these things, Emolga. I'm just not cut out to be an adventurer like you guys are."

Emolga huffs. "That's not true!"

"You're just saying that because you have to."

"No! I know things don't always go well for you-"

"They never do."

"But your heart's in the right place, guy. It's pretty hard to find such passion for exploring like that these days."

Dunsparce doesn't say anything, but Jen steps in, seeing the same opportunity you do. "So you want to be an adventurer too, Dunsparce?"

"It's my dream. Well, it was."

"Don't give up so easily."

"I've been going after it for a long, long time. This isn't easy for me. Kids like you are rescuing Pokemon like me. I'm a failure."

"Don't say that, it's-" Jen stops, reconsiders. "Dunsparce, why did you want to be an explorer?"

He hesitates. "Well, I thought it'd be awful nice to see all kinds of different places on adventures, of course. But I also wanted to help others who were in need. I wanted to give courage and hope to those who were suffering."

"So, if you give up on that dream, won't you be just letting those Pokemon suffer? Won't you just be leaving them there, when they need your help?"

"I can't do anything."

"Not if you say that. And maybe not right now. But you will be able to."

"There's a huge gap between dreams and reality, you know," Dunsparce says quietly. "Just because you can do it doesn't mean I can."

"Dunsparce, do you know what my dream is?"

"You're the one who owns this land, right? Then, to build a Paradise for all the Pokemon in the world?"

"How plausible does that sound?"

Dunsparce doesn't reply to that. "Look, it doesn't matter, it's over, it's done, I'm not going to be an explorer anymore."

"Why'd you want to go somewhere like Stompstump Peak again?" Emolga asks softly.

"I just wanted one of the crystals there."

Wordlessly, Jen takes the one you picked up and places it on the ground in front of Dunsparce. She watches him closely, and his eyes begin to water.

"It's this one. The one I was looking for. Too bad I wasn't strong enough to get my own..."

"Then it's yours," Jen tells him. "We just picked it up because it looked pretty, but if it's what you put yourself in such danger for, it probably means more to you than to us."

Dunsparce is about to cry again, but he chokes out, "Thank you so much! I'll never be able to pay you back, adventurers."

"Jen and Ned," you say.

"Jen and Ned..." Dunsparce mumbles, turning the names over in his mouth. "Weird. But you're Snivy and Axew, right?"

You realize then that you can't tell the full story without revealing your true identity. "It's a bit of a long story, but we'd prefer if you called us by those names instead."

"I see. Jen and Ned. Jen and Ned." Dunsparce tilts his head. "Two boys making their own Paradise in the middle of nowhere, huh? You kids are crazy."

Jen sticks her tongue out. "I'm a girl!"

"How old are you, Dunsparce?" you ask.

"5476." What's that? 14, 15 years old? Not that old.

"Whoa, then," you stutter. "What's up with the age difference between you and Emolga?!"

They pause and look at each other. "You think we're...?"

"No, no, no, not at all," you say quickly, backtracking. Can't let them know that was actually exactly what you were thinking. "I mean, as an adventuring pair."

"Oh," Emolga says. "Well, you know, bros are bros, no matter how old."

"You're a boy?"

"Wait, you thought that-?!" Emolga sighs. "Kids these days, so assuming, so blind."

"What?! No! Bros are bros, no matter how old, right?!"

"How old are you two?" Dunsparce asks. You just follow Jen's lead and say that you're about a dozen days younger than her. You haven't even thought about trying to measure your own age in days.

"If you don't mind my asking," Jen says, coming back to the matter at hand. "Dunsparce, why were you searching for that crystal?"

He goes completely red but doesn't say anything. Emolga smiles. "So that's it? You didn't have to go to such trouble, you know. I could've gotten it for you."

"No way! You're much more charming than me! You would've-" he cuts off, burying his face into the grass.

"You wily scamp!" His best friend teases. "So that's what you were after, huh?"

"Oh, now we're getting into gossip, are we?" Jen says, wearing a mischievous grin. "Sure, I think we have time for this."

"Hey, Dunsparce, you want me to tell it, or can you muster up enough courage to prevent me from twisting everything the wrong way?"

Dunsparce groans. "Just go. Just do it."

Emolga giggles. "Well, Jen and Ned, here's the story. Assuming the two of you were gone for the last week or so- I mean, I didn't see you anywhere or nothing- I've got to tell you that things happened."

"Yeah?" you urge her on.

"Yes, a very, ah, shall we say, absolutely gorgeous and beautiful Pokemon came into Post Town. Everyone grew enamoured with the lady, I could practically see their eyes all glued to her. And though, yes, I must admit, she is indeed very pretty, I don't see anything desireable about her personality."

"Drop the prose, please," mumbles Dunsparce's face from the dirt.

"Okay, fine. So, anyways, everyone fell head over heels for her the moment she came into town. Like, literally, everyone was swarming her and everything. No, seriously, like, even all the little kids- you know, Rufflet- they were all talking about how perfect she was looking every single day. Wow, even the shopkeepers wouldn't stop staring. 'Tall, graceful figure', 'cool confidence'... the list of traits they could think of just went on and on."

"Where does Dunsparce come in?" you ask.

"Don't say it like that!"

"Shh, be patient. So the other day, she went into the inn, and sat next to the carpenters, who I swear were drooling!"

"The carpenters?! Gurdurr, and the Timburr brothers?!"

"You know them?"

"They built our house!" You chew on your lip. "So, uh, continue."

"And everyone followed her into the inn, and everyone in town was in the inn at once, and Swanna was just, like, sitting there, and watching. She was like, 'oh god, again?!' and it was the best thing I've seen all week. So everyone in the inn was flirting with her at once, and I would've thrown up at that point, but Virizion just kept saying things like, 'thank you', and laughing super daintily. And then, Gurdurr asked her to stay in Post Town forever, even though he knew she was a wandering vagabond."

"Wait, what? So about Dunsparce?"

Emolga sighs. "He likes her, okay?"

Dunspace groans loudly.

"He'll do it tomorrow. It'll be big."

"We'll make sure to come in and watch," Jen teases.

You think a break would do a world of good, too.