"I have looked over the list of mystery dungeons with a demonstrated husk presence, and I think we would get the most out of examining Greenspook Steppes first."

Scizor was standing in his office, across from Blizz who was getting the mission info for their first attempt at figuring out what the hell was going on with the husks.

"Greenspook was the first location where a husk was seen," he explained, not waiting on a confirmation from Blizz to see if he understood. "As such, whatever caused this condition would have had the most time to develop here."

Blizz nodded, but still had a look of uncertainty. "So uh, what exactly are we looking for here?"

"That is a good question. From the first-hand accounts we've gathered from Hydreigon's Raboot, they did not eat or drink anything before the issue arose. As such, we want your team to look for anything that could be... broadcasting an effect, for lack of a better term."

"...Am I looking for a fucking radio antenna?"

Scizor stared at Blizz, confused.

"Sorry, human thing. Uh, any clue what it could be though?"

"...There is a chance it's the work of a Pokémon. If you see someone who is visibly unaffected by the effect, there is a good chance they are involved in this… Given that they are not human."

Blizz nodded. "So just trying to see if there's any Pokémon around?"

"That's only one possibility. Alternatively, it could be an item generating this effect." Scizor opened up his folder containing all the info he had on husks, looking for a specific sheet of paper. He read it at breakneck speed, before immediately sighing.

"According to this report compiled by Beheeyem's Guild, the most likely sign that an object could be producing this effect is… that it is glowing." He suddenly sounded completely exhausted. "That is the official statement. If something is glowing when it shouldn't be, take note of it."

He slid Blizz a pen and notebook, which Blizz took and placed in his bag.

"Alright, trying to find another Pokémon or some shiny thing and write it down. Easy."

"And I should not have to specify this, if you were to find anything, do not bring it back. Understood?"

"Yea, gotcha."

"We also have one additional request, however it is not as pressing."

"Hmm?"

"We would like you to take a feral from a nearby dungeon and introduce it to Greenspook Steppes. We do not yet know if the effect that causes husks is once-off or continuously active. However, all the nearby dungeons that have not been already lost to the husks have a very strong feral population. So your best option..." Scizor dragged his claw across the map. It traveled west from Greenspook Steppes, coming to a rest at Overgrowth Woods. "Here. This dungeon is the closest that still has a virtually harmless feral population."

"Yo, Overgrowth Woods, that was my first one… Still gonna be a pain to run two in the same day though."

Scizor seemed to consider that. "...That is true... I will have Team Spark help you out. They will go through the dungeon and get the feral out, then your team will escort it to Greenspook Steppes. Does this work?"

"Yea, for sure. Those guys are awesome."

"Wonderful. I will give them their mission, I want your team to be at the entrance of Overgrowth Woods in 2 hours."

"Gotcha."

True to Scizor's instructions, most of Team Apex was standing outside the dungeon right on time.

"...This will be miserable," the Prince commented. "We have to travel for nearly an hour carrying a feral."

"Remember back when we had to carry outlaws back to town every time?" Kibo reminded him. "The ferals here are super small anyways."

The Prince was almost as annoyed by Kibo's remark as he was by the mission assignment. "When we used to transport outlaws, were they conscious or unconscious?"

"Well, unconscious."

"Will this Pokémon be unconscious?"

Kibo looked down. "...I get it now..."

"This would be easier if we had Zar with us too..." Rune's voice had a tone of bitterness.

Somehow, they managed to lose track of the second Treecko while they were waiting for Blizz to come out of his meeting with Scizor. She was standing next to Kibo one second, he turned to wave at Sneasel, and when he looked back there was a note on the wall.

"Not like we're gonna be fighting that much today anyways," Blizz pointed out. "It's a full-on husk dungeon, all the ferals are just gonna be laying around and doing nothing."

"And what if we do encounter the hypothetical Pokémon who is the cause of this?"

"Look, we took on four legendaries at the same time, how hard can one dude be?"

Rune's eyes widened slightly. "You did it again..."

"...Did what?"

The Prince stepped in to help, fully in agreement with Rune on this. "You say things such as 'how hard can it be' or 'what can go wrong' frequently. Every time you do, something goes terribly wrong."

"...Okay yea, but we've never really gotten really fucked up aside from Fanita."

"There are fates worse than being knocked unconscious, and you personally have introduced me to several of them."

Before the discussion could go on, two golden pillars of light shot up from the ground as Team Spark arrived.

Chimchar was the first to speak, casually tossing the Metapod he was carrying to the side. "Hey guys, got your feral!"

"Shouldn't you... not treat it like that?" Shinx suggested.

"Nah, it's a Metapod," Blizz pointed out, picking up and examining their test feral. "It's probably fine."

The Metapod itself was filled to the brim with the unyielding hatred and malice every feral was endowed with. Despite having no means to convey body language aside from two eyes, its entire being radiated unadulterated rage.

Blizz tossed it back to the ground, content with his assessment. As he did so, the Metapod struggled to bounce back towards Blizz with little success. "Yea, he looks good."

"Well good luck on your guys' mission!" Chimchar started on the path back to town.

"Hell yea, we're gonna fucking get it!" Blizz pumped a fist in the air.

Once the moment passed, he walked over to pick up the Metapod once again. While it was sorta trying to throw its weight around, it wasn't being too problematic. Plus, as the only Pokémon present with arms, he was really the only one of them who could carry the feral.

Still, he hung back with Rune and Kibo just in case their test subject slipped loose, letting the Prince take the lead.

After 10 minutes of walking, Blizz got bored of the silence.

"So guys, you think we should give the dude a name?"

The Prince didn't even look back. "No."

"So I was thinking, maybe 'D'? Since like, you got Blizz, then Zar, but you kinda need a D to round things out."

The Prince finally resigned himself to looking back at his leader. "I am continuously baffled by the stupidity that exits your mouth. Quite often I find myself believing, 'certainly there is no conceivable means with which he could do something even more idiotic than this, this simply must be the lower bound,' then you proceed to surpass my expectations in the worst possible way."

The Prince's rant hung in the air for just a moment, before Rune, Kibo, and Blizz broke into laughter.

"Bro that was like, one of your best speech things. Solid like... Giving it a 8/10."

"I'm saying 7," Rune countered, trying to hide a giddy smile behind a smirk. "I couldn't feel any of the usual underlying tension, the stress in the relationship between the Prince and you. It was all just...so superficial."

"Oh I agree," Kibo stated, putting on the most posh accent he could. "Though you only feel that because you have the context of what it could be, and aren't looking at what it is."

Their fake-critic speeches brought about another round of laughter. Even the Prince cracked a slight smile, though he would rather die than admit it.

Another half hour of walking took them out of the forest flanking the eastern boundary of Nova Town and into a series of large grass plains.

"Kibo, can you check the map?" Blizz asked. "Got my hands full with D here."

"Yea, let's see here... Alright, we're almost there. Look out for some really tall grass, that should be where the entrance is."

Now that they were in the dungeon's vicinity, their pace slowed down so they could search for its entrance. Rune was the first to pick up on it, an opening in a wall of grass three times as tall as Blizz.

Blizz sat the Metapod down, and took a knee across from it. "Okay D, this may be the end for you."

D stared back with murderous intent.

"These past 30 minutes where we knew you... best goddamned 30 minutes I've had."

"Hurry this up, I would like to return to town in a timely manner."

Blizz broke his gaze with D to scowl at the Prince. "Bro this is important, can't rush shit like this."

"...I am extraordinarily close to using Shadow Ball on the insect."

The two remained in a stare down for a few seconds, before D experienced another surge of homicidal tendencies, and tried to use Tackle on Blizz.

The attack connected, but did virtually nothing.

"...Okay I'm done with the bit." He scooped up the Metapod and led the way into the dungeon. "Let's see how this goes."

As soon as they stepped foot in the dungeon, they noticed that they dropped down an inch. The ground beneath them consisted of very thick grass that seemed to curl over wherever they stepped, leaving obvious footprints behind.

They continued on though, as Blizz sat D down. Team Apex stood a short distance away from the Metapod, checking to see if it was showing any signs of becoming a husk.

The speed of its hobbling did slowly increase the longer they spent on the floor, as did the intensity of its Tackles.

"Ya know, usually Metapods use Harden a lot," Kibo pointed out, lazily walking away from its last Tackle attempt. "Weird for it to not do it at all here."

"Then it is likely undergoing the rampage segment of husk transformation," the Prince argued. "We will need to see if it goes through the final stage, however."

As if on cue, D abruptly froze. Its eyes, once so full of hatred for all things living, glossed over as it fell to the side.

The team gave it a few minutes to make sure it was actually done trying to attack them before approaching.

Blizz bent down, trying to listen for any breathing. "...Yep, he's alive." He stood back up, looking D over one last time. "Dude's definitely a husk."

"So it appears that whatever causes the condition does not go away with time," the Prince reasoned. "Or at least within the months between the husks' first appearance and now."

Blizz considered the information for a moment, before partly casting it aside. "Good to know, but we still gotta get through the dungeon. Ferals shouldn't be an issue, but we have no clue how deep it is. Plus like, imagine all the cool loot we could pick up from here since no one's been through in ages."

The last point caused the Prince to perk up. "...Very well, let us continue."

They swept each floor as they worked through the dungeon. While normally with outlaw missions the posting described what floor they needed to be on, they didn't have that kind of direction here. Thankfully, with all the ferals of the dungeon now husks, there was zero risk to any of them.

They agreed to split up, examine every room on the floor, and meet up at that level's staircase once they were done. Under this arrangement, the exploration went by fast, though without many results.

Despite clearing each room as they passed through every floor, the only thing they found were feral husks, and true to Blizz's promise, a good amount of items. Nothing that was helpful in figuring out about the husk stuff, however.

After several hours of searching, they gathered around the staircase to the final floor, waiting for Blizz to catch up.

When they saw the shape of a Treecko, they got ready to make the descent, before the Prince stopped them.

"Hey guys! What'd I miss?" Zar approached the three, acting like she was with them the entire time.

"How did you know where we are?" the Prince asked, immediately.

Zar cocked her head, legitimately confused. "What do you mean?"

"You vanished before anyone could tell you our destination for today, yet you somehow managed to find us on the final floor of a mystery dungeon."

"...Is that not normal? I just followed your guy's footprints."

The Prince forced his words out through gritted teeth. "It most certainly is not normal for you to have gotten through a dungeon as large as this so quickly."

"Huh... well good to see you guys!" She walked over and took a seat next to Kibo. "So what're we doing here? I saw all the Pokémon here look really sad."

"Were it not for your absurd level, I would kill you myself." The Prince sat down, keeping a wary eye on Zar. For her part, Zar didn't notice at all.

Eventually, the team leader rounded the final bend. "Sorry guys, couldn't find- oh, hey Zar."

"Hey Blizz!"

"Yea so I didn't see anything on my search, everyone ready to move on?"

The Prince sighed and went down the staircase, wanting to spend as little time as possible next to the two Treeckos.

The final floor was an open room with a warp tile on the opposite end, a clear sign they made it to the end of the dungeon. As Blizz jumped down the stairs, he scanned over the room.

"Let me know if you guys see anything, if this dungeon's got anything for us, it'd be here."

There really wasn't much to see though. The room looked to be completely empty, aside from the warp tile and walls of grass surrounding them. Even the floor was completely clean, meaning no one stepped foot in here for a while.

"What are we looking for?" Zar called, poking her head through the grass of the dungeon wall.

"Either a Pokémon that doesn't look like it's dying or something that's glowing," Blizz shouted back. "Or really just anything that doesn't look like it belongs, to be honest."

"...Hey guys?" Rune called out to the rest of the team from behind the staircase. "...Can someone come look at this?"

Because Blizz was the closest, he obliged, coming over to Rune's side. "What's up?"

Hidden behind the staircase and a layer of grass was a hollow metal pipe. The area around it was a bit distorted too, in the same way the grass flattened out wherever they stepped.

"This isn't normal, right?"

"No yea, definitely. Good eye." Blizz bent over to study it, pulling it up out of the grass it was buried in. The piece couldn't have been more than an inch or two wide. The hole in the center was slotted, like something else was meant to slide into it.

"...Do you know what it could be?"

"Not a fucking clue. But uh, Scizor would probably wanna know." Blizz took out the notepad that Scizor mandated he carry with him. He tried to get a trace of the shape, and made a rough sketch of the piece.

Rune nodded, then went back to searching the room, though there didn't seem to be much else around.

Eventually, they called it in. The only new information was a weird-looking pipe, but still, that's maybe sorta a start?

After leaving the dungeon, they went straight back to the guild to report their findings to Scizor. Without the whole "constantly fighting ferals" thing they used virtually no supplies, which meant the rest of the team got to do nothing for the remainder of the day while Blizz met with the assistant guildmaster.

"Yea so uh, didn't find anything major or whatever. The Metapod we got still turned into a husk when we brought it in, so we know the effect stays."

"Hmm... Unfortunate, but good information to know." Scizor wrote it down in his notebook. "You said you didn't find any major discoveries, was there anything minor?"

"Yea, so we found this kinda weird pipe thing." Blizz flipped open his notebook to the page containing the sketch of the pipe. "We thought it was kinda weird, since like, looked like nothing else had been there for forever, then you got this random thing of metal half-buried. Looked like it was moved around kinda recently too."

Scizor quickly looked up from his writing. "How do you know it was moved?"

"Right so like the floor of the dungeon had a ton of give, you'd just sink down a bit wherever you walked and leave this massive footprint behind. The area around the pipe kinda looked like that too."

"…Do you know how long these impressions last?"

"Well Zar was able to track us through the dungeon, so they at least stay for a couple hours. Could ask her, like, how faded they were when she found them."

Scizor looked back at his notes. "...If footsteps within this dungeon create such an imprint, this pipe you're describing also makes an imprint, and we assume that the Pokémon we're looking for went through the dungeon to leave this pipe behind, that would imply that they do not leave behind footprints..."

Blizz's eyes lit up. "...Yo, that's… pretty big. That means they'd have to be a flier or something."

Scizor nodded, opening up a new book on his desk. Blizz couldn't make out the text within it, but he could see several black and white sketches of different types of Pokémon.

"I doubt it would be just a simple flying type Pokémon," Scizor explained. "Many of them require to be in motion to remain suspended in the air, simply hovering in place is usually more effort than it's worth." Scizor opened a new sheet of paper, and began alternating looking at his book and writing something.

Blizz sat by with a surprising amount of patience, idly watching as Scizor flipped each page. Every once in a while, when he came across a Pokémon that could hover or levitate, he wrote a new name down on his paper.

Eventually, he stopped on an image of a Hydreigon.

The two Pokémon stopped and looked at each other.

Scizor's eyes narrowed, already knowing what Blizz was thinking. "...I assure you, he can't be involved in this."

"Okay but like, it kinda all makes sense," Blizz argued. "Well, maybe not motive, but everything else. He organized whatever the hell went on with Misdreavus, he can float, it's checking a ton of boxes here."

"I will not hear it." Scizor didn't break eye contact with Blizz. "While Hydreigon... has changed for the worse since I was familiar with him, for him to intentionally cause something as severe as this is utterly absurd. It was one of his guild apprentices that was the first explorer to become a husk."

"Pidgeotto blew a massive lead back at the Guilded Games. Also like, you weren't there, but before it started he told her 'Don't fuck this up or everyone else will hate your guts.' Like, if there was any one of his apprentices he'd do that to, it'd be Pidgeotto."

That seemed to take Scizor back for a moment, but he pressed on. "...Hydreigon is not that type of Pokémon. This is the end of the discussion."

Blizz, however, decided this would not be the end of the discussion. "Absol said he'd believe it."

Scizor froze completely. He slowly turned back to face Blizz, struggling to keep his voice even. "How familiar are you with Absol?"

"He was the first guy who figured out we were human. Apparently I'm kinda like a disaster magnet?"

Some calm managed to return to Scizor's voice. "...I shouldn't be surprised he would cross paths with you. And I take it he told you the history of Team Breaker?"

Blizz nodded. "Absol had to either take it easy or quit, Hyregion was cool with him leaving, you and Lucario weren't, right?"

"...That is a vast oversimplification, but I am not in the mood to correct you right now. So yes, that is right."

"So yea, been talking with Absol about a lot of this stuff before I came clean with you guys. Mentioned my idea that the reason I got abducted was because Hydreigon was pissed about the games, he thought it could be right."

Scizor brought up a claw to his forehead. "...I will speak to him directly about this. While I still firmly do not believe it, I would have assumed Absol to share the same belief as me. For this to change... In any case, I believe this discussion has gone on long enough. Here is your payment for the mission, otherwise you are dismissed." Scizor left 200 Poké on the desk for him.

Blizz picked up the cash and went straight for the door. He was no stranger to irritating Scizor, but this was a different level of discomfort, and he could tell he kinda overstayed his welcome.

He went back to Apex's room and threw himself onto his bed. The only other person in the room was Zar, the others went out into town for one reason or another.

"So how'd it go?" She seemed to be as full of energy as always.

"Eh, not bad mostly. Told him the stuff we found, brought up that it could be Hydreigon behind it all. I know you weren't paying attention when we were actually explaining this shit and have no clue why any of this stuff matters, but whatever."

"Yep!"

"Yea so anyways, he finally said he'd talk to Absol about it. Making some real progress here."

"That's great! Are we gonna have more cool adventures?"

"Hell yea we are." Blizz held out his hand, fist-bumping Zar.

"Can't wait! You guys are awesome to hang out with."

"Uh, yea, while we're on that, kinda wanted to ask about your whole 'randomly disappearing' thing. Like, it's kinda funny, but also a little annoying and none of us have any clue where the hell you go."

"Oh right, that." There was a silence that invited Zar to elaborate further.

Zar did not elaborate further.

"So uh... you gonna explain what's up with that?"

"...I don't think I can."

Blizz looked over at his teammate. "What do you mean?"

"Well... I usually have to go somewhere."

"…Can you elaborate?"

"Don't worry about it!" Zar's cheerful tone had a hint of discomfort behind it. She really wanted this topic to be dropped.

"Look this is like... I mean, I trust you, but if we're in the middle of a batshit dungeon and we need the help, what happens to us if you just disappear again?"

Zar frowned slightly. "...Yea, you make a good point... But I really can't tell you what it is."

"...Why?" Blizz was mostly just confused here.

"It... I mean..." Zar sat up on her bed. "...You know I'm strong. Like, really strong."

"Yea, couldn't tell if you actually knew or not though."

"Right, well... there's a reason I'm like that, and because of it, I have to deal with something every once in a while. But trust me, if you guys are really in danger, I will be there. Please, just... trust me." The last sentence came out with far more conviction than Blizz expected Zar to have.

Blizz lowered his goggles once again to look Zar dead in the eyes, lowering his tone to be just as serious.

"Do you promise?"

"Yes." Zar nodded. "I… It's been two days and I love being with you guys. I'm not gonna let anything get in the way."

"Then I trust you," Blizz decided. "I'll try to get the Prince off your back."

"The Prince doesn't like me?" Just like that, the normal Zar was back.

With the moment gone, Blizz relaxed as well. "I mean the dude hates everyone, shouldn't feel bad about it."

They both laughed, joking around and chatting until dinner.

"Are we almost there?" Angel rushed on ahead of the four explorers, then immediately tripped because it was too dark for anyone but Mira to see right now.

"As it stands we have no way of verifying this," the Duke stated. "When we resigned, we had to turn in our Wonder Map as well."

The reminder of their resignation caused all four of them to shudder. None of them had the courage to tell Hydreigon directly that they were quitting, so Mira did it through Lycanroc. Though he was really professional about it and understood why they didn't want to go through the guildmaster, it still felt like things weren't settled.

But this was what they had to do. Hydreigon not only banned them from looking into the husk crisis, they weren't even allowed to take missions for the rest of the week on the chance that they snuck off without guild approval.

Hydreigon was already mad as hell at them for asking, and none of them wanted to imagine what it would be like if they told him their plan to join Lucario's Guild instead.

So they went through Lycanroc. It hurt all of them when they lost their Silver Rank, but they could probably earn it back way faster now since they could knock out A-rank missions easily.

It didn't help that as they stepped out of the guild, there was a massive explosion in the center of Tenea City. Despite not being guild members, Ride still flew over, but came back in 10 minutes. The police supposedly had it under control, and exploration teams wouldn't be needed.

So they began the day-long journey out to Nova Town.

"So what's gonna be the plan once we reach the guild?" Angel asked. "Reforming Terrae, right? Not gonna join Apex?"

"While I respect the Prince, it would be a disservice to confine ourselves to only following behind them," the Duke reasoned. "Should we be cleared to join, we shall reestablish our team. However, I predict that a closer collaboration with them will occur regardless."

Mira couldn't afford to look off the path, as she was the only one on the team who could actually see. Still, she participated in the conversation. "If we'll be working on dealing with the husks together, we might as well be on the same team anyways."

"...But that'd be a nine person exploration team," Ride pointed out. "...That's almost as large as a guild."

"Which is the other reason we will be reviving Team Terrae," the Duke stated.

"They're gonna be so surprised when they see us!" In her excitement, Angel ran forward again, tripping yet again.

The Duke only rolled his eyes at this behavior.

Back at his home, Absol was casually reading a book by the fireplace. It was warm summer nights like this where everything was quiet that really were the best.

His attention was shifted from the book when a blistering headache shot through his body.

"Dear Arceus... There's more of them..."

Given it was already late by the time Team Terrae arrived at Nova Town, they decided to ask about joining Lucario's Guild the next day. Instead, they booked a room at the inn, enjoying a night of sleeping in an actually comfortable bed.

"...Do you guys think Hydreigon really did it?" Angel completely failed to pick up the fact that the others would probably prefer to focus on sleeping, rather than discussing how their former guildmaster may be ushering in the apocalypse.

"...It's hard to say," Mira admitted. "We really don't have any real evidence, but a lot of things line up, like him banning anyone from investigating, or knowing that we went to Hollowturn Temple."

"Ultimately, we do not know, and this is not a scenario in which we can act rashly," the Duke summarized. "Our purpose in leaving the guild behind is to gather the required information so that we can make a confident assessment."

"Right, yea..." Angel seemed content with those answers. "Gonna be crazy though, can't imagine what having Lucario as a boss is gonna be like."

"This conversation does not appear that it will be yielding any constructive dialogue, and I would appreciate rest at this moment. If there is nothing else of value to say, then please silence yourselves."

While a small part of Angel wanted to shout as loud as possible just to mess with him, she relented, shutting her mouth and trying to get some sleep.

Ch 19: Bad Reputation - 5/14/22