I'm sorry it has been so long since the last update! I've been terribly busy with so much stuff, I've had little time to work on my stories. That, and I've felt the necessity to see 9 and Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs. Go see them, they're great films!

But here's a long chapter, please enjoy!

Chapter 6: Beginnings

I woke up the next morning to perhaps something worse than what I had gone through with any alarm clock or even from parents. "HEY! TIME to WAKE up! That means NOW!" I groaned with exhaustion, sitting up and looking at the doorway. Standing there was an irate Loudred that gave me a funny look. "Ah, you must be that human they've been talking about. I don't see anything special, you sure you didn't hit yourself really hard on the head?"

It was my turn to give him a funny look. "Well, unless I somehow completely imagined the last sixteen years of my life, then I'm positive that I was human." Loudred continued to stare at me doubtfully before turning around and leaving. "Whatever. Make sure your partner there is up, breakfast will be ready shortly, and then your team will be assigned missions for today." I looked at Phloe, who was surprisingly still asleep with her busted arm lying across her stomach. 'How did she sleep through that?' I wondered.

I stood up, my mind beginning to remember everything from yesterday, especially after Wigglytuff's bumbling mistake. At least Loudred didn't hate me like Styx did, but he still found me odd. What a way to start off here. "Hey," I said, shaking Phloe. "You know it's time to wake up."

"Ungh…give it a rest, Clove. Just…another hour…is all…" she mumbled. 'Who on earth is Clove?' I thought, completely bewildered. I began to shake her even harder now, but not before a punch was delivered to the side of my face. "…Ow." I said with one eye twitching. Phloe groggily turned her head to look at me. "Oh!" she exclaimed, removing her fist from my jaw. "Sorry, Tide. I didn't really mean to do that."

"Yeah, I know," I said, rubbing my jaw as she stood up. "The Loudred here woke me up and told me to get you up. But I now know that we need to come up with something else in case this happens again," I said, putting my mind to work. "I got it," I said suddenly. "I'll just jab you with a stick until you wake me up."

"Then I'll just grab the stick and whack you with it in the head."

"You've just got to ruin my ideas, don't you?" I asked, pretending to be offended. Phloe shrugged. "As long as we're partners here, then I'll keep it up. At least to the bad ideas. Now come on, let's go to breakfast. I'm not going to be eating scraps this morning, especially with our first mission." She began to walk to the door. As she opened it, she turned around to me. "Aren't you coming? I know you've got to be hungry."

I sighed heavily. "After last night…well, you get my point. Loudred at least wasn't too critical about me. He just said he saw nothing special." Phloe put her right hand out as if to say "well there you go." "I don't know if you heard me last night," she said. "But it seemed most of the teams were indifferent to the…revelation, that Wigglytuff gave." I wasn't buying it, and it was showing. "Come on Tide," she pleaded, walking over to me and grabbing my arm. "If you don't want to come out on your own, then I'll help you. And imagine the reactions of everyone else in the guild…"

I nearly lost it there. I quickly shook off Phloe's hand and wobbled onto my feet from my back. "Okay, okay! I'll believe you and give this a shot. But…I really don't want to face it if anyone else decides to hold a grudge against me for my past." I began to walk out, Phloe following right behind me. "They haven't really gotten to know you," she argued. "If you weren't so afraid that you'd be rejected, then maybe you would be able to handle this better."

"I'm handling it fine!" I said, continuing to walk down the hall. At this point, we had managed to turn a few heads at our conversation. Phloe sighed. "See, you're just overreacting. And beginning to cause a scene."

"No, they're looking at me because I was a human. They think I'm a freak." At this point we had managed to get into the mess hall and sat down. I look around nervously at the other pokemon. A few were staring in my direction, some whispering to one another. I could see Styx over on the other side of the room. I couldn't tell if he was laughing or growling at me. Probably both.

Two pokemon, a Shelgon and a Vibrava walked up to the both of us just as we were about to eat. "Uh, excuse us," said the Shelgon. Phloe and I turned to see what he wanted. "Yeah, I was wondering…were you really a human before?"

"Did you beat innocent pokemon?!"

"Quiet, Sant!" The Shelgon yelled at his partner. The Vibrava, a girl by the sound of her voice, flinched at her partner's scolding. "Sorry for that," the Shelgon said. "Sant here…she doesn't know when not to ask certain things. So just forget she ever said anything."

"But I wanted to kno-"

"Enough!" The Shelgon blasted a quick shot of Dragonbreath at his partner. Throughout the entire time this happened, Phloe and I kept exchanging glances with each other. We were both thinking the same thing. This team had problems.

"Listen," Phloe began, stepping down from her seat and turning the two around. "Tide…he doesn't really want to talk about this right now."

"So did he do that to your arm?"

"No he didn't!" Phloe snapped. This got Sant to immediately shut her mouth. "This was from something else. He just doesn't want to talk about what he was before with anyone. Can't you tell that it's hurting him, too?"

The Shelgon looked me up and down one last time. "I guess you're right…okay, let's go Sant. We'll leave him alone; he probably is putting up with enough already."

After the two left, Phloe took her seat back next to me. She seemed to be flustered, but any sign of it disappeared moments later after she began to eat once again. "Hey," I said. "Thanks for that."

She smiled. "No problem. At least you didn't lose your nerve there in front of those two. I mean, what did I tell you? They weren't there to be mean to you, definitely not in the way Team Hades is."

"Yes, that's exactly why the Vibrava kept pestering me about if I beat pokemon. Really? What kind of rumors do they hear? It's not like humans regularly harm pokemon. In fact, the only ones that would are criminals."

"You know what I mean," Phloe replied. "They were actually being kind of nice, at least the Shelgon was somewhat. The Vibrava there, Sant…well, I can see your point. But I would guess she's always like that."

"Joy of joys. Another exploration team I'm just thrilled about meeting."

"Hey, Phloe and Tide! You mind if we sit next to you two? Of course not, common courtesy, right?" A Beedrill, who I recognized to be Pin, yelled out to us. He took a seat right next to me, with his teammates, Scorp and Puffer, joining on the other side of the table. "Speaking of other exploration teams…" I mumbled so that only Phloe could hear me. She reached over with her left arm and gave me a jab in the shoulder. "Ow! Sorry!"

"Huh? About what?" Pin asked. I turned back to him. "Oh, nothing. Just something between me and Phloe. Pin nodded and turned to the berries in front of him. Scorp and Puffer had already begun eating, the both of them ravenously eating what was in front of them. "Come on you two! You're supposed to wait for the leader before you eat!"

"We got back from a ridiculous mission last night, and you hardly let us eat then!" Scorp argued, still wolfing down the berries. I could see that Phloe was slightly repulsed by their behavior. "So now we're making up for lost food intake! Besides, I think Chatot was going to make us go for a convict today."

Pin groaned. "Again? That'll be the fourth one in two weeks!" He muttered a few complaints to himself, as well as a few curses towards Chatot before beginning to eat.

After a bit, Phloe and I had both finished, as had at least half of the other teams in the room. Most of them had begun to head off, and we were going to follow suit. I had been fortunate to have not had any more confrontations with other pokemon about my past. Then again, it's not like it would have mattered since I only remembered moments before becoming a Squirtle. Unfortunately for me, Team Sting wasn't going to let me off that easily.

Just as Phloe and I stood up to go, Pin tapped me on the shoulder with a drill. "Hey, Tide, listen here for a second. I'm speaking for my team as a whole when I say this: we don't care whether or not you were a human before you were a Squirtle. Jeez, for all we know, you may just be crazy. But that's beside the point. The point is, we have full trust in you that you're a good person, and being a former human does not change that." Scorp and Puffer nodded in agreement.

Hearing this from him made me feel much better, to be truthful. I knew at least they trusted me. Perhaps Phloe was right; maybe I had been overreacting with the situation…

"Hey, thanks Pin," I said. "That does mean a lot to me. To know that at least some pokemon here trust me. I was afraid that…well, most wouldn't."

"I know. I saw Team Hades reaction last night about you. Seems you know them?"

I grimaced. "Let's just say that Styx was the second to find me as a pokemon, and he wasn't too happy to figure out I was a human."

"Well, Styx has been that way. He apparently had some kind of an incident a few years ago and…the result has made him a lot nastier towards others, especially when humans are mentioned. No one really knows what happened, but plenty of rumors go around the guild."

"Odd." I said, letting what Pin had told me sink in. So something had happened to Styx before that brought him to this state. I could only imagine what. But before I could ask any more questions, Pin began pushing me and Phloe away. "I believe that that's enough for now! You two better get to seeing Chatot about your team's first mission. Best not to keep him waiting. That bird can get quite the temper when he's forced to wait."

………………………………………………………………………………………………………

Arriving outside of Wigglytuff's office a short while later, Phloe and I began to wait around. Mostly, this was because we were just a little bit nervous to knock on the door in case we disturbed Wigglytuff. "Well…go on Tide. Be a gentleman!"

"Oh come on! You can't be serious about trying that!" I countered. The Treecko was about to say something back to me when Chatot's squawks caught our attention from behind. "Ah, Team Impact! Good morning to you both!" We both nodded to him, saying quick "good mornings" to him in return. "I believe you both are ready for your first day of missions, am I correct?"

"Yes, sir." We both said. This seemed to please him as he gained a smug expression on his face. "Good. Now, follow me to the job board." He fluttered upstairs with Phloe and me following right after him. Up the ladder we went and found Chatot perched on top of a board on one of the walls. It seemed to be littered with tons of papers, the contents of each we could only begin to guess. "This is the job board. Every day, your team is expected to come here and take one or more jobs from the multiple selections here. It is updated daily by another guild member, Dugtrio."

"So, we just come and take at least one of these missions every day? That's it?" asked Phloe. "Well, not exactly," replied Chatot. "You see, the missions are given difficulties based upon the danger of the Mystery Dungeon as well as upon the overall difficulty we feel it deserves. Therefore, rookie teams like yours usually stick to D ranks, sometimes even C ranks. As you work your way up, you can take on tougher missions, eventually making it up to the S ranks. Got that?"

We had both lost interest in Chatot's speech and placed our attention upon the job board, attempting to decide what mission we wanted to take. "Erm…okay, good luck Team Impact. I would definitely advise though, that you choose something that wouldn't be particularly straining upon you both because of your arm injury," he motioned at Phloe, "and your…well, lack of experience, I should say." I looked down in slight shame, fully knowing what he meant. "Well, I suppose I shall leave your team alone for now. Good luck once again; I hope your first mission ends successfully." With that, the strange music parrot flew back to the lower floor of the guild.

I looked back to the board after he left. "So what mission do you think we should take? Right now, I think this one looks good." I pointed to a scribbled piece of paper. It read, 'Please get my Reviver Seed back for me! I lost it when I was getting out of Beach Cave. I think it was on basement floor 3. Please help! Signed, Izzy the Spinda.'

"Sounds easy enough, plus it's got a D rating for it," I told Phloe. "What do you think?"

"It's better than what I could find. Which is, before you ask, nothing."

"Alright then. We'll take it!" I concluded, ripping the mission paper off of the board. "Okay, now to just put this away in the…oh crud, we forgot the Treasure Bag and stuff back in our room! I'll be right back!" I shouted hurriedly, madly dashing down a hallway to where the rooms were. I quickly went back once I got the Bag and Badge from our room, running back up to meet with Phloe. "This is what happens when you worry over trivial things." She said to me. "Yeah, yeah, whatever." I rolled my eyes, slinging the Treasure Bag over my shoulders. "Let's go. Sooner we get the mission done, the better." Saying nothing more, we both climbed up and out of the Guild, although this proved to be rather difficult for Phloe with only one usable arm.

We walked down to the bottom of the guild's cliff and found a map posted on the side of the pathway for exploration teams. Phloe took a quick peek at where the Beach Cave was, and without any moment wasted, we headed off to the south where it lay.

………………………………………………………………………………………………………

The Beach Cave wasn't terribly bad. Sure, it was dark and gloomy, as well as being quite damp, with plenty of puddles and even underground ponds and lakes. It also seemed to be quite empty and rather…dull. "So, this is the life of an explorer? Exciting." I said dryly. Phloe gave me a look. "This is what happens when you don't give things a chance. Hmm, sound familiar to something that occurred, what? Not even a day ago?"

"I'm getting better; I already trust a good deal of the guild. At least most of them, just not Team Hades for obvious reasons."

"See, you just need to give things a better shot, and plenty of time."

"And how much time do you expect me to give into this?" I asked. As if Arceus himself had answered, a rather angry Shellos crawled out from under a rock in front of us, blocking our path. The pink snail thing hissed at the both of us, causing us both to back up a few steps. "Happy now?" Phloe asked me. "Uh, define that for me. Because right now, I'm freaked out for my life." The Shellos continued to stare us down, not moving any further towards us. "It isn't going to move for us any time soon," Phloe observed. "So it looks as if we'll be fighting our way through this. Just what explorations teams are about!"

"What happened to the treasure hunting and stuff?"

"Don't question me now! This thing isn't going to be waiting for us anymore by the looks of things!" Sure enough, the Shellos hissed once more before raising its front forward and slapping it into the mud beneath it. This resulted in a spray of mud going directly into my eyes, temporarily blinding me. "Gah! That hurts!"

"Hang in there Tide, I'll try to take it on for now!" my partner said while I rapidly grinded my fists into my closed eyes. Who knew mud could sting, even if it wasn't that effective upon me! A few minutes later and I had just about managed to get the mud out. From what I could hear, the battle wasn't going terribly bad. Phloe did have the type advantage going for her, so I was confident things would end well. At least, I was for a moment. "Tide, could use your help right about now! Being one-armed at the moment isn't exactly working for me!" I opened my eyes, thankfully with clear vision. I could see Phloe back against the wall with the Shellos standing right in front of her preparing a Mud Bomb. She looked to be slightly fatigued, but I couldn't see anything really hurting her much. "Hold on there, Phloe! I'm coming to help!" I yelled, running at the Shellos. I wasn't really thinking much at the moment, just to help my partner and not let her get injured.

The slug pokemon was caught completely by surprise as I rammed into its side, taking out the rest of its energy. It crashed into the opposing cave wall and slumped in a heap unconscious. Phloe sighed in relief and turned to me. "Thanks for that Tide. Glad you could finally help."

"Yeah, no problem. And it looks like I just figured out how to use a Tackle."

"Was it really that hard?"

I blushed. "Er…well, I guess not. But that's beside the point. Let's keep going! We got at least two more floors before we can actually go and find that seed." I hefted up the Treasure Bag and ran off down the cave. "I see that the enthusiasm has returned to you…" Phloe muttered before running off to catch up with me.

………………………………………………………………………………………………………

The next floor wasn't very different. Truthfully, it looked almost the exact same. Then again, what was I to expect in some cave? A bunch of gems dotting the walls? Anyways, we encountered a few more rogue pokemon that got in our way. A Kabuto and two more Shellos, to be precise. Thanks to what I was figuring out, we were able to take them out rather easily, but not without some damage. We were both becoming bruised up, and we still had another floor to go.

"The next floor has the seed," panted Phloe. "We go down and get it, and we can get out of this place."

We both hopped downstairs, and surprise, surprise! It looked the exact same as before. "Let's go, the seed is around here somewhere. We just have to look." Phloe said. She creeped down a pathway to our left with me flanking her, making sure nothing came up from behind us. The corridor opened up into an expansive room, bigger than any other we'd been in so far. But no seed. There was two angry Corsola, but no seed.

Phloe wasted no time. She ran up to one of them and used a Pound with her tail. It screeched and immediately collapsed. It seemed this one was rather weak. That only infuriated its friend even more, as the thing began to use Tackle on her. Now, I figured Phloe was a tough Treecko. After seeing her fight Styx, I had come to expect a lot. Since she was now being struck down by an irate Corsola, that changed. But it was all thanks to the fact that she was still recovering from her injuries that Styx had inflicted. She fell to one knee, grunting as she tried to get up. I ran at the Corsola and tried another Tackle, hitting it in the side and causing it to fall over. Unfortunately, they didn't experience the same issue as I did, since the thing flipped right back onto its feet.

Before it could do anything else, Phloe began to use Absorb upon it, sucking the last of its energy back into her. The Corsola didn't stand a chance, and promptly collapsed. "Now I'm feeling a bit better," she grinned. "Let's finish this mission."

We tried a few more passageways that lead into at least four more rooms. No such luck in finding the seed. We were about to give up when we checked one last area. Unbelievably, we could see a yellow seed just sitting near a corner of the room to our right. Thankfully there were no enemies around, so we ran quickly to grab it in case any did show up. "Finally! This nightmare is over!" I cheered. My happiness soon turned to gloom when I realized something else. "And even more nightmares are soon to follow. Aw, great." I slapped my forehead in frustration. In spite of our states, both me and Phloe managed to laugh a bit at my behavior.

"Yeah but we'll have fun with this. It will be a grand adventure as we get to explore so many different places across the land," she said as she picked up the Reviver Seed and put it into the Treasure Bag, pulling the badge out in exchange. "Ready to go back?"

"I don't know, I'll let you take one good guess." I grumbled. Phloe laughed as she pressed the badge, transporting us back to Wigglytuff's Guild.

………………………………………………………………………………………………………

"Oh, thankyouthankyouthankyouthankyou!" A Spinda, whom I could only guess to be our client, cried. He cradled the Reviver Seed in one of his arms as he shook both of our hands. "Ah, now here's your reward!" He hefted a bulging sack of money that I graciously took into my own arms.

"We…get paid this? For a…seed?" I gaped at the sheer amount of the money. Phloe was equally mesmerized by it. The Spinda in front of us nodded happily. "You don't realize how important this seed is to me! It's a gift from my family; I never want to be separated from it! Thanks again explorers!" He said before running up the ladder, at least as well as he could. On his way he nearly ran into another team and the wall.

As soon as we were sure that Izzy had gotten up and out without killing himself or anyone else, we returned our attention to the sack of money we had been paid. "I think I'm beginning to like this life as a pokemon much more now." I said, practically drooling at the shining coins.

"I know what you mean," Phloe replied. "Now just what to use it on…" But before we could even begin to ponder the possibilities, Chatot suddenly arrived from nowhere. "Team Impact, welcome back! And within good timing, it's already about dinner!"

"Already dinner? We weren't there that long…were we?" I asked. To be sure, I dropped the Treasure Bag and ran to look out the nearest window. Sure enough, the sky was already a golden color as the sun was about to set. "That's how Mystery Dungeons can work. They don't follow the normal laws of nature, and generally do whatever they want, including completely redesigning themselves every time you go through one. Now that that's understood…the guild's pay share must be collected." He promptly swiped the bag out of my hands and pulled out what probably wasn't even a tenth of the money we earned, which he handed back to us. "Here you go, a fitting payment I presume."

"But…this is hardly anything. Why can't we have the rest?" Chatot sighed. "Everything here needs to be paid for you know. Thus, the way we manage to get the payment is through our exploration teams. We get most of the money for supplies like food and whatnot while you get a fraction to spend on what your team needs. Now that everything is cleared up, I will say good job to you two again. Especially with your two current issues, you seemed to have done surprisingly well. I suppose you'll best go off and have your injuries checked over for the time being, and I believe by then Chimecho will be ready with dinner."

"Okay, thanks Chatot." Phloe waved him off, and turned to me. I was currently frowning at the money that we had leftover. "Okay, life as a pokemon just became bad again." I concluded.

………………………………………………………………………………………………………

Deoxys woke suddenly yet calmly. He surveyed the area around him with interest. Unsurprisingly, he was still in the cave he claimed, sitting cross-legged. 'Interesting…those were…dreams. Of what? Just…of so many pokemon. They each seemed to radiate power before me…some even more than others. And that one…the white one in the center. He…he was Arceus. I can tell. And the others…were they…the Legendaries? Just what was the meaning of that?'

Deoxys stood up, recombining his tentacles into hands to help do so. He activated a special vision of his, thus seeing through the walls of the cave. He could see many pokemon around him, some roaming the dug-out halls, some sleeping, and others tending to their families. 'A family…just what is that like? Arceus has filled my mind with so much knowledge, yet…I don't understand. What are parents? What are children? Siblings? What is that like? There are so many pokemon that are alike…they eat…they mate…they live life. But me…I am on my own. Just what is this feeling? It hurts inside…and I don't know why. Why can it not end now? Why can't I be left to my own ideas? Must I be pained? Arceus…this is your fault. I have not figured out my purpose. Just what is it?'

The alien pokemon's eyes began to glow, and he looked up. His arms split into four tentacles once again, each coming together at a point. Immediately, he shot a Hyper Beam through the ceiling, annihilating anything in the way. This left a hole going straight up and out the top of the giant rock that Deoxys and so many other pokemon called home. As soon as the attack ended, Deoxys flew up through the hole until he reached the top. He landed gracefully on his pointed feet and took in the landscape.

From what his eyes could tell, it was late at night. The air had a chill to it, something that Deoxys had taken notice of. It seemed that the longer it had been since his creation, the more he noticed and understood. 'And yet…there is so much I wish to understand. Arceus…my destiny. What is it? WHAT IS IT? ANSWER ME!'

Deoxys doubled over in sudden pain, clutching his sides. 'What…' But before he could realize what he was doing, he reared back up until his heart faced the blackened sky. His heart began to shine brightly, launching a massive burst of energy from within. The energy spread across the sky, going up into the heavens as well as miles away in every direction, forming an aurora.

'Pain…that's what I feel. I understand that much. Arceus…you are at fault for my pain. You have given me this…loneliness. AAAGGHHHH!' He screamed mentally, his body morphing into a spikier version of itself, his attack mode. Without delay, he began to launch Psycho Boost after Psycho Boost into the desert and beyond, laying waste to whatever was in their path.

………………………………………………………………………………………………………

"Arceus! Do you realize what you've done?!" Dialga demanded. The Legendaries were huddled around a massive pool that showed Deoxys' current actions on its surface. Arceus solemnly stared at the scene as it unfolded, ignoring the time deity's question.

"Arceus, normally I would not question your actions, but this has become dangerous," Palkia said. "I mean, I assisted you innumerable times before for all sorts of crazy missions, such as your recent request but…this has to be stopped sooner or later. Your 'pet project,' Deoxys, has become a threat to himself and everything around him. I would not be surprised if he didn't lay waste to the entire world, like a certain pokemon nearly did."

'Are you trying to imply something, Palkia?' Mewtwo mentally growled. 'I would wisely think of what you would like to say next; the wrong words may just cause you to become the first immortal pokemon to die.'

"Enough," Arceus interrupted. Every legendary stopped talking at looked expectantly at the Alpha pokemon. "I know exactly what I am doing. Please, be patient. The damage he does will be over soon, I can guarantee it. I have even had Celebi check upon how everything shall end up."

"And?" inquired Palkia.

"And, everything shall end a-okay," answered Celebi cheerfully. The forest spirit floated to the center of the group, hovering several feet above the water. "It may be a bit, but Deoxys shall correct himself, and become a very responsible pokemon. He shall become a valuable part of our group."

"That is, if time does not fluctuate," Dialga added. Celebi shot him a look of contempt. "The outcomes of the future are ever-changing variables. They are never definite until they happen."

"Unless they already happened." Said a livid Celebi.

"Even so, everything has the freedom of choice, does it not? Therefore, I do not trust that Deoxys shall end up the way you claim."

"Dialga, have patience. Celebi knows what she is talking about. And I do not doubt you either. You do control time, so you would know all about it. But please, trust me on this. Give this time; it is imperative that this all falls through. Otherwise, so much will have been for nothing.

How was this? I personally liked writing this, although I'm a little iffy with writing the missions themselves. The next chapter should come out when I get the one after mostly written. You guys'll like the next one, the first OC team is introduced (sorry for the wait SakuraFurude).
Speaking of OC teams, please do submit if you have one.
Team Name
Members w/Gender, Names, Species
Background/Experience
Moves