My eyes felt like concrete as I lifted them open. I saw white the moment they opened. Was I finally back? Was I dead? These are pretty acceptable alternatives. I don't even care about the crippling debt, it'll be just like college again.

Then, the white moved, and there was brown, rocky stuff farther away. It was then I realized that was just the metal of the beetle. "We're still doing this," I muttered, realizing my body was still racked with the sense of pain, both mental and physical. My vision was steadily becoming less blurry. I cannot believe that I was still here.

"Wait, we are? But you took a… But you're… Wow. I guess you really are into this! We're gonna do our best! Come on, Tony!" For fuck's sake, woman, that was not what I meant.

"Gusher," I demanded, holding up my hand. The ground was welcoming, but I probably should try to fix the whole 'hurting all over' thing that I had going on.

"Don't hurt yourself," she warned. I felt the gusher in my hand, and threw it immediately into my mouth. I chewed furiously, the juice of life spilling all over my internals. God damn was that great. I could feel my body awaken, and the pain numb. I don't even care if half of that gusher was aspirin, it felt great and was delicious.

I immediately jumped onto my feet, feeling a massive surge of energy. Sure, I didn't feel like I was standing up with how short I was, but you know what? I was on top of the world, and that's all that matters.

"You ready?" Peachy asked me.

You know what? Fuck it. I'll take this fever dream by the balls. I was here to stay, wasn't I? I woke up three times here, and that's the lucky number. I don't have debt to the hospital to worry about, nope, not at all. Wonderful! "Abso-lutely. Let's go do that thing we were supposed to do."

"Rescue Magnemite?"
"Yeah, rescue magnet," I passively responded, walking forward. I didn't know where I was going, but at this point, the hopeless feelings are behind me. I kept plodding along. No need to think about stuff that will never be, like my old life.

"Are… You okay? You seem really, really peppy all of a sudden. I'm not saying that's a bad thing, by the way," she began, rapidly talking faster and faster, "If you thought I was complaining or saying it was bad and I'm sorry if you thought I was complaining, I was just kinda-"

"Yep, perfectly fine. Nothing to worry about at all," I quickly interjected. Not broken at all. Nope. This colorful world I am now trapped in with zero of my friends is just fine.

She is barely able to take in my words as I throw them out, "Worried, oh, okay."

Silence came again as we wandered the place. I eventually found a staircase and went down it. Have I ever mentioned how out of place these staircases are? I just thought it was fever dream magic and called it good, never even thinking about it, but like… They're just here. A mysterious staircase in the dark leading lower and lower. Most sane people wouldn't even go near it. Knowing I exist in this realm, I shouldn't, but playing by temporal rules like 'fear for my life' is something I needed to snuff out if I wanted to survive being around Peachy.

At the bottom of the staircase was a wide open space with… Another staircase. I look back, and ask, "Uh so… Do we search every level or do we just-"

"Oh! Most Pokémon say what level they're on, but I think this one is on the deepest level of this cave. At least, I think, I don't know for sure, and if it isn't then I don't really-"

"You're doing the thing again," I remind her. She keeps going on and on on things that don't particularly matter until they do.

"What thi- oh. Right. Sorry, I'll try to um… Not focus too hard on things," the beetle behind me nods.

I give it a lazy thumbs up. Bottom of the cave, we go. I make my way over to the next staircase and plunge down further into the depths. That makes this… What, the third floor?

I look around the drop off point, and see it is another pretty large room. There is another purple rat hanging out around here, as well as a pink berry and more coins just lying around. I'm beginning to think gold actually has little value in this world since apparently people just leave it lying around.

Anyways, I approach the rat as it walks towards me. It flings itself at me slowly, and I easily duck out of the way. While it's confused, I give it the ol' one two with a very light slap. It collapses feebly.

"You know, there is a massive difference in power levels down here, to be honest. Some are just rats, and then you have fryer orbs of death," I point out my findings.

My travelling buddy puts forth their retort, "Orbs of death? Don't you mean Voltorbs?"

"I meant what I said and refuse to conform to your terminology."

"But… Tony, here's the thing, you're weak to electric type attacks. They don't hurt me as much because-"

"Because you're literally made of metal. See, I'm subject to fleshiness, unlike the majority of you."

The beetle seems to stop following me for a solid few seconds, then follows quickly behind me, "Oh! I think I'm starting to understand this sarcasm thing you employ!"

I wasn't being sarcastic, I was being hyperbolic. Well, actually, no, my statement is just true. I just groan in response.

"Afraid I'm learning the ins and outs of your favorite weapon?" the beetle asks in a tone that implies it has the upper hand.

"No, I'm afraid you're evolving backwards," I tell her, picking up the pink berry, "Where's the bag?"

"Bag? What bag?" she innocently asks.

"The… Toolbag. That's the name for it."

It blinks, "Toolbag? I've never heard of a Toolbag. Is it like that sarcasm thing of yours?"

"You're fucking with me, aren't you?"

"I don't know what that means."

Of course you don't. "Just… Put this wherever it goes," I hold out the berry for her to take with whatever method her stubby legs had.

"But I'm confused, Tony. Where would it go?"

Alright fine. I'm taking this berry and you can't have it. This will be my reminder that there is a special place for people like you. I pull the berry towards myself, and hold it in my palm. "You know what? I think I'll hold onto this. I hate sweet things, but this can be my emergency rations."

"Oh, you don't need to worry about those, I have plenty of apples stored in the Toolbox." While we're walking, I spot the distinct twinkle of more golden coins.

I'm not playing this game with you right now, my mind is on the money, "Good, then I guess we can continue along the way. Go and pick up those coins, if you'd please. I have a plan in mind for them."

"Will do!" the beetle tells me, skittering over to the pile of coins.

I look for the nearest exit out of this big room and make a beeline for it. Look, as happy as I was to not go this alone, I need some space right now. I'm stuck in this world with an overly energetic beetle that I signed my soul to for the cause of rescuing people in the name of chucklefucks. The least I can ask for right now is for some peace and quiet in the darkness.

The corridor I'm in is pretty narrow. It winds almost like a snake, and although I can see around the place, I am not at all comfortable with such low light. Normally I'd have a phone or something, but right now I don't have shoes, pants, or really anything except this berry.

I need to find civilization in order to spend these coins I've been accruing on things that will make my life more bearable. I need supplies. Then, finally, I need to find a way home. I am convinced that whatever magical bullshit occurred to get me here is still around. To give myself a time frame, I want this done in-

"Tony! Wait up!" I hear from down the hallway, interrupting my thoughts.

I groan loudly and stop my plodding. I can't have the little things or the big things anymore. This feels more harrowing than high school did, and that sucked pretty bad. I'm in between a lot of thoughts and stances right now, and this beetle did not help.

Half of me wants to just wake up from the nightmare, and another half of me wants to go along with it. I'm a mess. I need to get my act together. At some point, there's going to be something down here that is going to ruin me if I'm not in a solid mindse-

"Thanks for waiting for me. I was uh… Beginning to think you wouldn't," the beetle interrupts me again, causing me to jump up slightly in surprise. "Not that I don't trust you! Believe you me, I haven't had a partner in a long time, or really, ever, so I'm glad it's you but also you happen to be a bit grump- oh no, I'm doing it again, aren't I?" she practically spurts out of control before finally taking a breath at the end there.

I give her some pats on the head, and say, "Yep. Let's get going." I turn and start heading back on my path, this time with a presence behind me the whole while.

"Alright! Let's do our best!" Peachy shouts behind me enthusiastically.

Ugh… Alright. I'll play your game a tiny bit. I put a finger up, however tiny it is, and waggle it a tiny bit as I say in a small voice, "Woo!"

I can't hear anything behind me besides walking, so I look back. The beetle appears to be in a normal state. Good. I pacified her. I look back forward. Wait. No, just forward. It's just then that I spot another dingo.

"There's another poochyena ahead of us!" the beetle announces, prompting the creature to come barrelling through the corridor towards us.

"Wow, thanks, I never would have seen the thing directly in front of us obstructing our way."

"Really? You must have some pretty bad eyesight," the beetle demonstrates their clear lack of understanding of the concept of sarcasm once again. "Just kidding, I think that was sarcasm that time."

I look back once again, and think on what I could say. Now, I could be mean about this. I could. But… Honestly, maybe it's better to have her figure out what it means instead of just guessing every time. "Good job. You figured me out." I focus on the dingo, which was now almost in front of me.

While Peachy begins to cheer about something, I let loose the sigh I've been holding in for a while now, a torrent of water flowing out of my mouth and smacking the dingo in front of me. It falls over in response to the hosing I gave it, but actually gets back up.

"Huh. That's new," I say without thinking. I'm not used to them getting back up.

The dingo immediately turns tail and starts to run away. I'm not used to them running away, either, but I won't complain about that one.

"Oh, yes! Some Pokemon in their wild states are naturally fearful of being defeated in battle, and would rather flee than allow themselves to be defeated! It's said to be a part of ancient Pokemon survival instincts. I don't know the validity of it, but-" I decide it's better to just let her do her thing and tune her out.

I wanted to break it to her that I didn't want any more book facts, but I think reading a book or two might actually help me in the long run. I just have to be in the mood for it. For the past day and a half, literally none of my life has been in my control, and I may be doing better now than like any of my stints in an apartment, but that doesn't change the fact I have had some terrible days recently.

"Isn't that interesting?" she asks, me snapping out of my internal thought monologue just in time to respond.

"Yeah, I think so. You sure do know a lot, huh?" I responded, wanting to get her onto another subject so I can go back to focusing on where I'm going.

"Indeed I do! But you know what I know that you don't?" she asks.

"Probably a lot of things, but what did you have in particular?"

"I know where we store our items," she says in some dark tone I don't like.

"Oh yeah? Where's that? The Toolbag?" I smirk knowingly. Looking further downward, the corridor opened up to another room. I see an opening within the room, leading me to think there are more stairs in there.

I felt a bump against me, and I stop, looking back to see the beetle looking at me. I must look pretty smug right now. I ruined your joke, and I know it. That's what you get for trying to outsmart me, bitch. I know all your moves. Book smart people think they're so smart until they meet someone like me. "The. Toolbox," she said quietly, trying to emphasize her size, which was tiny compared to me. Was she trying to intimidate me or something?

"Toolbox? We don't have a box with us."

"I'm going to tackle you if you keep this up, mister! I'm feeling some of your grumpiness right now!" she threatens, trying to still make herself bigger.

"Do it," I dare, "Bet you won't." I make sure to bring my eyes right down to her face mask, pointing my snout downwards. I uh… Don't exactly know how to feel about the snout. I'm just now noticing it. I am a crocodile so… I guess it comes with the-

I can bite people. I can one hundred percent bite people. I didn't even think of this until now!

The beetle backs away awkwardly from my face, and almost falls over. She recovers swiftly, and has the gall to have her eyes turn… Resolute? Angry? I don't know. She backs up, her eyes close, and she starts a prance towards me.

You can't be serious. There's no way-

I feel a sharp sting along my entire body as I find myself planted firmly on the ground, looking up at the beetle. From below, she appears to have some segmented dark greyish body, like a carapace. I'm still convinced she's a beetle and nothing has showed me otherwise.

I'm surprised she actually did that. I let out a few chuckles, some out of pain and some out of surprise, and accede, "Alright! It's a Toolbox! You win."

The beetle almost looks satisfied, but then her eyes go wide, jumping up and away from my fallen form. "Oh no! Did I hurt you? I didn't actually mean to, I thought you would just dodge out of the way and that we would just go back to the way we were-"

I put up a hand, trying to get myself up with the other one, "No, it's good. I'm good. You made your point." You know, if we were going to be relying on each other down here, I don't think attacking each other is a good policy. In fact, I'd say that's almost certainly going to end up with us being destroyed and left for dead down here. "Hey uh… You know, I don't think fighting each other will do us much good down here. Whether physically or over what to call something. So… Let's save any kind of arguments for outside of here, alright?" As I say this, the beetle's eyes and body posture go from scared to some vague form of happy, "Don't think this means you've won everything! Just the Toolbox thing."

"You know, deep down, I thought a shove would work, but I didn't think it'd work this good," Peachy says quietly, probably so I couldn't hear. Jokes on you, my hearing is apparently really good. Also, we're in a corridor in a cave. I can hear pebbles moving. You being quiet means nothing down here.

For the sake of the argument, I'm not even going to address that. We have a magnet to go save, and we've been wasting time in this corridor. I also didn't want to get rammed by a miniature freight train, but that was a separate worry altogether.

From the corridor to another room in relative silence, we find another staircase. Down we go to the… Fourth floor? Yeah, it should be the fourth. We enter into another fairly big room at the bottom of the staircase.

Aaaand there's another staircase. "So… We keep going down, yeah? Don't check out anything else, right?"

The beetle lady nods, and affirms, "Yes, that's the plan."

I make my way towards the next staircase. "Cool." As we're walking, however, I see another rat appearing off in the distance, likely about to try and stop me. "Oh no. I'm not dealing with you today!" I pointed at the rat with accusation in my voice. I sped on down the staircase, shouting, "It definitely won't follow us, let's go!"

"But that doesn't make any sense!" I heard Peachy yell behind me, hearing her metallic feet pittering upon the steps.

"It does in my mind!" I shout, making my way into another decent sized room at the bottom of the staircase. I look up to see the iron beetle coming down, finally making her way to the bottom with me. I kept looking up, and saw the rat. It peered down the stairs with hungry eyes before turning away, skulking the upper level. Holy shit, I didn't expect that to work.

Just before I could feel properly vindicated that I made the right choice, Peachy roared out, "A Cheri Berry! Those are known to cure paralysis!" She was poking a leg at a berry that sat on the ground. It was red and attached to some weird green vine.

"A cherry, huh? Neat," I went over to it and snagged it. "Wait. Hold on, if it heals paralysis, and paralysis completely stops your body, how are you supposed to use it to heal paralysis if you can't move to use it?"

"You have someone with you to administer it, duh. Berries 101, Tony," she says in a know-it-all fashion.

"Man, I'm glad I read that book in my time unconscious in that field."

"Me too," she nods.

"Okay, yeah, but what if you don't have someone with you?" I asked the obvious question. I looked around for a corridor to go down, and there was a left and right set to go down. I decided to go down the left. Might as well get a move on.

"Why would you be going somewhere where you can get paralyzed without someone with you?"

"Didn't you say something about never having a partner before? Then why were you wandering out where I was conked out along where you could have gotten paralyzed?"

She was silent for a moment, then made a small "Ah" sound. I got you this time. "That was… I mean… Look, that was just one time." She was rapidly losing ground.

I had to capitalize on this if I wanted to win hard. "Uh huh, 'just one time'," I mock, "How many 'one time's do you think exist?"

"Just one," she said with some hint of agitation, "It's in the title. 'One Time'. I don't know what's so hard to get to that conclusion."

"I dunno about that. What if-" My no doubt brilliant response was cut off by a huge yellow and black striped… Thing approaching. It had two huge arms, two stubby legs, some round body, and two electrical socket things on its head. Looked like you could plug it in somewhere. Actually, just looking at height, I don't think it's taller than me, but it definitely had me on weight. "Woah there, big guy," I said out of instinct.

The beetle behind me gasped, "An Elekid! That's an electric type pokemon! Let me handle it, Tony." I can feel her attempting to push past me, and I decided it was best to let her take the lead on this one.

Thus, we swapped spots. The 'Elekid' didn't let her do this in peace, though, delivering a solid punch to her back. The only problem is that her back is literally made of metal and has like some small horn thing. The idiotic creature immediately yells in pain, holding its hand angrily. I feel like I can relate it in a small way, at least mentally.

The beetle proceeds to dip its leg in some pool of mud I didn't see before, and throws out a bunch of mud at the Elekid thing. It proceeds to fall back as mud covers it, whining out once again and eventually collapsing. "I thought this ground type move would be more effective," she states, turning back towards me, "Crisis averted!"

"Good job, you smeared mud on something," I push past the beetle, resuming the expedition forward.

"It wasn't just mud! It was a new move that I got from getting stronger!"

"Whatever you wanna tell yourself," I tell her. I saw what I saw, and I'm still not buying into much other than that I'm trapped here and this is not a dream.

We reached another big room. In it was another blue rat thing. I moved into range, sighed, and blasted it away. Seriously, there was no real combat in this world, huh? Nothing… Exhilarating, I guess. Most everything has been over in one or two 'moves', if you want to call them that.

Now taking another look around the cleared room, there was another corridor, an apple lying on the ground, and another staircase. I'm really fast tracking this whole thing, huh? I yoink the apple and set on the journey down the stairs.

Down the stairs, we entered some larger corridor leading to a dead end. At the very end was two of the floating magnet things, and they appeared close together. Peachy points out, "Oh, there they are! Let's get them out safely!"

Yeah, alright, fair enough. It's what we came here to do. What even was the reward for this again? "Right, let's go."

The walk to them was pretty quiet until they seemed to notice us, "BZBZT ARE YOU THE RESCUE TEAM?" Why? Why were you designed in such a way to inflict maximum pain to my ears?

"Yes, we are! Come with us!" Peachy responded to them for me. She then looked at me, "You'll have to help guide them. I… Don't have good graspers." Bullshit, you've put things into the bag! I saw it! I saw it all! You lie!

I nod regardless, and wordlessly grab the magnet people. And so, the ascent began. Surprisingly, nothing bothered us on our way up. That's two times now we've gone up one of these things and not once has something bothered up while going up, only down.

As soon as we trekked into the light, my arms not at all tired since the magnets were floating, an anomaly I will never get over, the magnets themselves separated from each other. I guess the magnetic pull stops the moment light hits them? This fairy world nonsense is too eldritch for me to understand. The four magnets assembled before us rejoiced happily, one shouting, "OUR BODIES SEPARATED. BZBZBZZ. REJOICE! BZBZBZZT!"

Ow, my ears. "YAY! BZBZBZZT!" Stop.

"YAY! BZBZBZZT!" I DID NOT ASK FOR MORE.

"BE THANKFUL, YOU TWO," one screeches to the others, "YOU ARE OUR HERO. THANK YOU. BZBZBZZ!"

"Please never speak again," I say quietly, my ear canals likely bleeding by this point.

They passed us a bag that sounded like it was full of money, pulling it out from… Somewhere. In addition to this, there was some kind of seed and berry thrown our way, and they departed away, splitting apart before us without saying another word.

"Thank fuck, they're gone…" I tried to rub my ears to remove the sounds, but the memories will always be there. Why must they screech so much?

"Oh, it wasn't that bad."

"I have fleshy ears! You are them!" I say cryptically. I meant to say she was metal like them, but honestly, I couldn't be bothered. Shaking my head, I grabbed the bag, "Put the seed and other thing in the box or whatever, I'm heading home."

"Oh. Well uh… Okay! Wait up for me!" the beetle said, gathering up the goods. I'm gonna see if I can put some distance between us so I don't have to listen too much to her and she doesn't get the bright idea to do any sort of conversation making with me. She was just very awkward and I am probably actually having a magnet-related aneurysm.

I finally made it through the door, and walked on over to the familiar stone bed that I loved. By loved, I mean tolerated because it provided me a wonderful surface to bash my head against if I ever get to that point, which I'm rapidly going towards. I collapse on it once more, generally unhappy with how today has gone. I got dragged across long distances to go have my ears blasted by people who didn't know how to write, and proceeded to get hardly anything for it. I don't even know what's in this bag. What am I supposed to do with that seed, become a farmer?

I sighed heavily, no water coming out of my mouth this time. Disappointing, but I guess adrenaline is needed for that. "I miss the guys. Especially Ted. Ted was cool." Ted had everything sorted in his life. Job, stable relationship, a car, loving supportive family, good friends, good habits. Dude had it all. I had nearly none of that, but that's okay. We were still really good buds regardless. Hell, I'd say we were even best friends. He'd always be there for me, if I'm entirely honest.

I bring my hands up to look at them. If I had a phone, and these dumb ass small webbed hands could punch in his number, he'd find a way to come get me as soon as he could. That's the kind of guy he was. If you were in trouble, come the apocalypse, he'd be there for you. He'd just clock out of work, say he'd make it up later and something came up, and then he'd be on his way for you.

And now he's gone. Or, more accurately, I'm gone, and I can't see him again. It's not like he was perfect. Dude had a lot to complain about. We usually bounced our problems off eachother, just shooting the shit. Peachy must be wondering why I'm not so peachy, it's because I don't talk about the good stuff in life. There's hardly any of that worth mentioning, unless you're Ted. Lot of bad things going on.

What would Ted tell me to do right now? What would his half-joking advice be on this? Find some kind of- "I tried calling out to you, but you didn't seem to hear me the whole time!" I heard the familiar voice ring out.

"Can't a guy have some time for reflection?" I asked, still kind of in thought, so I couldn't really get the frustration across. Plus, I was on the ground right now, right on my belly.

"Maybe he could if he had stayed with me and made sure I didn't fall down or something! That was really irresponsible of you. We're a team, which means we're together and we work together. I don't know what came over you, but-"

"Oh my god, woman, I know!" I tell her loudly, not angry, just tired. "Sorry I didn't stay with you, I just wasn't feeling very good! Is that what you wanted?!" I wanted to say more, but my better judgement works better when I'm tired.

Peachy set down the toolwhatever on the floor quietly, looking downwards. "Yes, that's all I wanted," she responds quietly, moving over to her side of the house with the books and stuff. Just when I was getting used to the silence and about to start deeply thinking again, she spoke up again, "I wanted to say I was happy the job went well. I was… Pretty nervous and all. I don't know if you could tell." I could. Funnily enough, I wasn't nervous because I didn't care. "I… I do feel a bit tired after all the action earlier. I can understand if you're angry with me. If you'd um… If you'd like, I could move bac-"

"Don't pull the pity party shit on me, missy," I point from my position on the 'bed', "You signed up to have a comfortable home, you're getting a comfortable home. Plus, all your books are here, and I'd feel bad about it." Sighing again, one of my more common actions since coming here, I decide to skip all the sentimental back and forth and explain simply and truthfully, "I'm not mad, I just want to get back to deep thinking before my body decides it's time to clock out."

"Oh. Well, in that case, I suppose, um… Let's do good again tomorrow, alright?" she asks, trying to muster up some enthusiasm.

Wait, was I getting to her? Like, dragging her down? Damn it, Ted, now you've made me think about others, even when they aren't even humans. I hated that about him. He'd always stop me from ranting on some people because they might've been having a bad day too. Man, she's supposed to be a bundle of energy, not a debby downer. Peachy, not Debby.

I decided a solid, "Yeah. Let's," would do, and enter sleep mode. Or at least try to. I had a bit to think on, namely the world I'm not getting back any time soon.

Something's not right here. My dreams normally aren't this coherent. I don't know where I am, but I feel shifting colors around me, and I can think. Not only that… Why am I feeling like someone else is here? I don't know who it is, but I doubt it's anybody with good intentions. This feeling is strange. Really strange. Is this how I die? Not with a bang, but getting killed in my sleep?