Yeah, I bet that little bit at the end of last chapter was the last thing you all were expecting, but it's a nice change of pace, ain't it? Let's get into this.

February 6th, 11:57 am

Team Echoes' Base

Coast Continent

Cinder couldn't believe her eyes, "EXCUSE ME!?"

She snatched the note off the door and entered the room as quickly as she could, she wanted as little attention from everyone else as possible, especially Vulcan because if he found out that aliens were invading, oh boy would he lose it.

Cinder placed the laptop she was carrying on the floor and grabbed her treasure bag from beside her bed, then, she bolted out the door and to the Warp Panel in the lounge

February 6th, 12:02 pm

SurfSpark Guild - Guildmaster's Quarters

Coast Continent

Cinder ran to the Guildmaster's Quarters as quickly as she could, "Lanturn? I got your note! Are you messing with me!?"

The Guildmaster was currently sitting at the table with a bunch of other higher-ranking guild officials, such as Meganium and Chandelure. When Cinder burst into the room, they all stared at her as if she interrupted what they were saying, "Ah Cinder! You're just in time, we were just about to begin!" Lanturn bubbled as his lights flickered happily.

"I uh- it looked like you already did start though…"

Gimighoul jumped up onto one of Chandelure's arms and leaned in on her ear, "At least she's not completely clueless." He whispered.

Chandelure swatted Gimighoul away, "Show your superior some respect! She's the head of intelligence! Of course she's not stupid!"

Cinder was gonna put in her own two cents, but she felt awkward enough as is, so she stayed out of it, "So uh, are we all here for the same thing?"

Meganium nodded, "Yep, an alien was spotted in the Jungle Continent, and not the normal floaty pink one that lives there, no, an actual honest-to-goodness alien."

Cinder looked down and sighed, "My brother's not gonna like this…"

"Nobody really should like this! It's an alien invasion!" Nail shouted from the other side of the table, "You'd have to be the world's biggest moron if you think aliens invading is a good thing!"

Lanturn's lights dimmed as he pointed a fin at Nail, "Calm down Nail, it's not the end of the world."

"Uh, I may be a bit out of the loop, but I'm pretty sure it is." Meganium said in a soft voice, "I've read enough books about aliens to know that this is bad news."

Cinder began to grow more and more worried as this conversation went on, everyone seemed to be accepting that one sighting of a supposed alien was enough to spell the end of the world "H-hey wait a sec don't just throw in the towel! We can still do something about this!"

Everyone's heads turned to Cinder at that moment, causing her to sweat a little, "We should scope out the alien's intentions and go from there, alright?"

Nail rolled his eyes, "And by 'go from there' you mean die tragically, right?"

"No! I mean, we either fight it or we let it live!"

Gasps rang out throughout the room, "Let it live!? Are you crazy!?" Gimighoul shouted as he jumped onto the table.

"I agree with Gimighoul, that sounds absolutely preposterous." Arboliva chimed in, "Are you sure you're alright? Meganium and I can give you a check-up if you need."

Cinder politely declined, "I am 100% ok, I do not need a check-up. I was just thinking that maybe this 'alien' is just lost and scared, and we should do our job here as a guild to go help it."

Everyone stared at Cinder as if she herself was an alien, well except for Lanturn who smiled as his lights began to flicker brightly, "That's an excellent idea!"

Everyone at the table immediately whipped their head in Lanturn's direction, "WHAT!?"

"You heard me! This could end in a win-win scenario where we live and the alien crashes on our planet for a bit! Just think about it! Peace is our best option!"

Nail raised a concerned eyebrow, "And if that doesn't work?"

Cinder flared up her flames and jumped onto the table, striking a heroic pose as she did so, "We'll show 'em the fastest way to leave this planet!"

Nail shrugged, he couldn't argue with Cinder's determination, "Alright then, just try not to get dissected or something."

Lanturn clapped his fins, "Well that settles it then, Team Echoes will set out to greet this alien and attempt to make peace with them."

Cinder frowned as she realized that she'd probably have to round everyone up and arrange cross-continental travel in only a few hours, "Does it have to be today? I'm kinda on break."

Lanturn, once again letting his laid-back attitude shine through, shook his head, "It can wait until tomorrow."

"WHAT!?" The guild members collectively blurted.

"I understand your concerns, however, if we give the alien time then we may be able to gain more intel on them."

Arboliva waved her arms around frantically, "But that actively puts innocent civilians in danger!"

"I know, I know, it sounds reckless, but just trust me on this one, things will turn out fine."

Arboliva tried thinking of a retort, but ultimately failed, with a sigh she placed the end of her arm on her forehead, "Oh alright… But if this backfires, you're gonna pay for all the medical supplies I need to fix whatever mess you created, got it?"

Lanturn smiled as he snatched Arboliva's… uh… Hand? Eh, close enough, and shook it violently, scrambling her brains a bit, "It's a deal!"

Arboliva placed her other appendage on her head until the world stopped spinning, "O-ok then…"

Lanturn floated back to his seat and chuckled, "So, any other objections?"

The room fell silent, which was kinda surprising considering the situation, but nevertheless, Lanturn smiled once more, "Alright then, this meeting is adjourned, you all can go back to chillaxing until further notice."

Everyone left the table, and as the tension broke Cinder noticed a critical flaw with her plan, 'Wait how do I break the news to my team without everyone freaking out?' She thought.

As she began the trek back to the Warp Panel, she began to worry that she wouldn't be able to go through with the plan when then it hit her, "Maybe I can just feign ignorance and pretend we're there for a different job!"

In a stroke of genius, she had devised a plan to get the gang to befriend the alien without knowing of said alien's existence, she would grab a job from the board that takes place in the Jungle Continent, and then she would tell everyone that Lanturn told them they had to take a break from chasing the whole void goo fiasco and that she had already grabbed a job for them, "Delightfully devilish Cinder, delightfully devilish indeed." She chuckled under her breath.

So Cinder took a little detour on her way back to the base, she swung by the Job Room and checked the board for jobs, she scrolled down the digital job board's screen for a bit, but she struggled to find anything, "Are there no listings for the Jungle Continent!?"

Sure enough, Cinder reached the bottom without finding anything at all, "Crud! Now what!?"

Cinder turned around quickly and tried to think of a plan b when she heard a pinging noise from the job board, she turned back around in a heartbeat and checked the board again. Cinder clicked the new listing without even reading anything about it, she was that desperate.

Warning: This Job was posted anonymously, it might be a trap, so be ready for a fight.

Heya, oh boy do I got a scoop for you!

I spotted a new species of Pokémon, the only problem is it ran away when I… Uh… Asked for a biography, Y-yeah, that's definitely what I was trying to do.

Odd wording aside, I would appreciate some help tracking it down again so I can properly introduce myself, I would be willing to pay handsomely for your assistance, so please, help me out!

Meet me in Tangle Town on the Jungle Continent Tomorrow , doesn't matter what time, just get here!

Cinder didn't soak in any of the job information, all she saw were those three important words at the end

Jungle Continent

Tomorrow

Cinder rushed to accept the job as quickly as she could, once the job was loaded onto her watch she rushed out the door and back home, 'MY PLAN IS SAVED!'

February 6th, 12:38 pm

Team Echoes' Base

Coast Continent

Once Cinder had returned home, she made her way back to her room, but as she was walking through the hall with her head held high, she heard a strange noise coming from Rory's old room. Cinder peeked into the room to see Yumi and Flint attacking one of the dummies, 'Wonder what they're doing in there.'

Cinder peeped her head in a bit further and heard Flint say something, "Just imagine your shadow creeping behind your foe, it doesn't really matter what you do after you pop up behind them, the surprise factor is what deals the damage."

Yumi looked a little confused, but she understood most of what Flint was saying, "O-ok."

Yumi stood up on her tippy-toes in an attempt to see past the dummy, but she ended up collapsing, garnering a huff from Flint.

Flint set Yumi back up on her feet and gave her a pat on the head, which somehow didn't phase straight through her, "Let's try that again." He said softly, "You don't need to see what's behind them to use the move, you just have to imagine your shadow moving under them and appearing behind them."

"But what if there's like lava or something behind them?"

"It doesn't matter here, just imagine your shadow sliding under the dummy."

Yumi closed her left eye as she tried to follow Flint's instructions, she tried to picture her shadow moving behind the dummy, as she pictured it her shadow began to move, however, the shadow went off to the left, stopping beside the dummy for a moment before continuing. Eventually, the shadow ended up behind the dummy, just not in the way that Flint had intended, "Well, it'll work."

"N-now what?" Yumi muttered awkwardly.

"Release."

"Release?"

"Yeah, just stop thinking about your shadow."

Yumi started thinking of something else when she instantly appeared behind the dummy, catching her completely off guard, "Eep!"

Flint nodded his head, "Good enough, now it's up to you to practice."

Yumi sighed before eying the door, she noticed Cinder sitting there watching, "Uh, Cinder? Why are you peeking in here like that?"

Cinder's face went beet red, "U-um, hi, uh, I was just uh, c-curious, I heard noise coming from in here, I-I wasn't snooping in on anything important was I?"

Flint shook his head, "You're fine, I was just teaching Yumi how to use Shadow Sneak."

"I thought that was what was happening." Cinder said with a nod, "Can I just say something really quickly?"

Flint brought his right wing to his forehead, "I know she messed it up a little bit, I'm a horrible teacher-"

Little sparkles appeared over Cinder's eyes as she smiled, "That was super adorable! I didn't know you had a soft side!"

"O-oh, well uh, thanks? I thought I made it clear that I deeply care about Yumi."

"Yeah, but you also made it clear that you can be a massive jerk sometimes."

A look of guilt appeared on Flint's face as he walked toward the door, once he was at the door he crouched down and put a wing on Cinder's shoulder, "Look, I'm deeply sorry about all the mean stuff I've said and done, it's just." He sighed before continuing, "I-I've been really stressed as of late, I mean, imagine having to help one of your best friends cope with the fact that they've been turned into a completely different species."

Cinder gave Flint a somewhat awkward look, "Y'know, surprisingly I've been there, I don't know if I ever told you this but before this whole thing with Joseph I had a completely different human turned Shinx friend, he even had amnesia to boot."

"O-oh, I had no idea."

"Well to be fair I got kinda tired of telling everyone, so I don't blame you." Cinder chuckled before continuing, "When I first met that human, he seemed almost unbothered by everything, but it wasn't that simple…"

September 26th, 8:21 am

Wigglytuff Guild - Team ShinyStar's Bedroom

Grass Continent

Christian was in his team's bedroom grabbing his bag when Cinder walked in to check on him, "Hey, Christian, Riolu was getting worried about you, so I came to check in."

Christian stopped fumbling with the items in his bag and turned his head toward the door, "Oh, hey Cinder…"

"Are you ok? You don't sound great."

"Oh, it's nothing… I was just daydreaming…"

Cinder noticed the somewhat worried frown on Christian's face and caught on to his lie, "You look a little too worried to be daydreaming."

Christian sighed, he knew Cinder caught on, "Alright… There has been something I've been keeping from you, I don't know if Riolu told you this but… I'm actually a human."

"Are… Are you pulling my leg?"

Christian shook his head, "Nope, unless I really hit my head too hard when I lost my memory, I really am… Or I guess was…"

"That's… Super weird… I couldn't even tell…"

"Yeah… You can thank my amnesia for that… The only things I can remember are my name, my favorite color, and my original species… And I'm not even sure if those are memories or my mind playing tricks on me."

"Wow, I uh, had no idea, you seemed so happy…"

"Yeah… Something about this world, it feels so strange yet so comforting."

"Well, do you think that there's a way to get your memory back?"

Christian's eyes widened a little as he looked at Cinder, "I… Never really thought of that…"

"Well, maybe once we get some time to ourselves, we could look into that."

"Yeah… I just wish I had someone I could talk to, y'know, about more important stuff."

"Can't you talk to Riolu about that?"

"He's still riding the high of working toward his dreams, I don't have the heart to drag him down…"

Cinder walked up to Christian and gave him a big hug, "Well then, I'll be here for you."

Christian's eyes widened once more, "Th-thanks." He said as he returned the hug.

February 6th, 12:46 pm

Team Echoes' Base

Coast Continent

Flint was awestruck, "I really had no idea, I guess we had more in common than I thought."

"Yeah, it's kinda a weird coincidence actually, we've both kinda been in the same situation, heck, I've been in it twice now because of Joseph!"

"I didn't even think of that…"

"Well, I hope that makes things a little less stressful, if you ever need to chat just drop by, I'm here for you."

Flint got back up and bowed, "Thank you, Cinder, I'll be sure to drop by whenever things get a little out of hand."

Cinder gave Flint a thumbs up, "Sounds good!"

Flint walked back over to Yumi and got back into a fighting stance, "Alright, you ready to keep training?"

Yumi nodded as she approached the dummy once more, ready to strike it down at a moment's notice, "I'm gonna tear the stuffing out of this flimsy thing."

Cinder walked out of the room and continued heading back to her room, once she made it back she grabbed her laptop, placed it on the floor, and plopped down on her bed, "Finally, I can just chill out and play some games."

Cinder clicked a random icon on the desktop and started up a game, but once she got to the title screen she felt a strange… Presence… Looming over her. Cinder flipped around to see Midnight slowly materializing behind her, "Uh, can I help you?"

Once she was noticed, Midnight sped up her little ghostly appearance shtick until she was fully opaque, "You haven't told anyone yet, have you?"

Cinder turned away from her keyboard, "Huh? Told who what yet?"

Midnight sighed as she brought her palm to her face, once she lifted her palm, she cut her eyes at Cinder, "About the alien, you haven't told anyone about it, have you?"

"Oh, no, I haven't! I- Wait, how do you know about that!?"

"Lanturn told me about it when he dropped by earlier, and then my parents told me, and then I read the note, and-"

Cinder waved her hands around as she cut Midnight off, "Ok! Ok! I get it! Just don't tell anyone about it, alright?"

"Why shouldn't I? They have the right to know!"

"B-but if we tell them they might start freaking out!"

"I'm sure most of them would be fine, I mean, you all have seen scarier."

"But Vulcan!"

"What about him?"

"His biggest fear is aliens! It always has been! If you don't believe me, then you can go ask him yourself!"

"Uh, alright, I guess I'll go do that real quick."

Midnight vanished into thin air for about a split second before reappearing mere moments later, "Wow, you were right, it is aliens, y'know for being separated for 20 years you really know your brother well."

"Thanks, I guess?"

Midnight bowed, "You're welcome."

"But you see my point, right? If we let him know about this, he's gonna flip!"

Midnight gave Cinder a slightly confused look before putting two and two together, "Oh, shoot! You're right! What do we do now!?"

"Calm down, I've already got a plan going, all you gotta do is play along, sound good?"

Midnight's expression grew dreary as a sigh escaped from her mouth, "Fine, but if this fails, I WILL possess you and make you look stupid, you hear?"

Now it was Cinder's turn to make sad faces, "Fine…"

Midnight's expression perked right back up as she let out an echoey cackle, " Ehehehehehahahaha, FOOL, you've sealed your fate!"

A huge sweat droplet rolled down Cinder's head, "What did I get myself into…"

Midnight responded by laughing again, this time in a completely normal tone, "You have no idea how long I've been waiting to do that."

"Right…" Cinder said before turning back to her laptop, "Well, I'm gonna chill out and play some games."

Midnight did a little spin, "OOH! Can I play too!? I learned how to possess electronics from a Rotom!"

"Uh, I guess? How would that even work?"

"Just don't worry about it! I'll make it work!"

Midnight flew into the computer screen at mach speeds, as she possessed the computer a split screen option became available as Cinder started up the game, "Huh, she wasn't lying, she really did make it work."

Suddenly, all the text on the screen was seemingly erased as "I told you!" popped up on the screen.

"Ok, that's just a little freaky, could you like, cool it with that? I've already had enough weird experiences with games today."

The text erased itself once more, this time the text was replaced with "You have?"

"Yeah… It's a bit of a long story… Maybe I can explain it while we play?

The text returned to its original state as Midnight's voice came out of the speakers on the laptop, "I'd be fine with that."

"Alright… Now where to start…"

Cinder started to recall the events that transpired mere hours ago as Midnight tried to figure out the basics of the game they were playing, they played for a while but ultimately failed to make any real progress in the game, but that didn't really matter, what did matter is that they had a ton of fun. After gaming for a few hours, the girls heard a knock at the door, "Hey Cin, we were gonna swing by the guild for dinner tonight, you in?"

Cinder walked over to the door and opened it to reveal a smiling Quilava on the other side, "Oh, uh, Vulcan! I'd be down to go to the guild for dinner tonight."

Vulcan noticed a slight awkwardness in Cinder's expression, "Is something up?"

Cinder's eye widened under her eyelids, "N-no! Nothing's up!"

Vulcan gave Cinder a skeptical look, he didn't buy what she was saying at all, thankfully, Midnight bailed her out by forcing the computer to make a sound. Vulcan went to inspect the sound when Midnight made the screen turn red as the word 'RUN' appeared all over the screen, bolded, and in all caps. He found this deeply unsettling, "Uh, why is the machine telling me to run?"

Suddenly, Midnight popped out of the screen and jump-scared Vulcan, "Your oven's on!"

"GAH!" Vulcan cried out as he jumped back, "What's wrong with you!?"

"Sorry, I just wanted to try the whole jump scare thing out, I never really understood why ghosts are so fond of them."

Vulcan sighed, "It's alright, just… Don't do that anymore…"

"Gotcha."

"I'll go ahead and grab us a table while you gals get ready or whatever."

Cinder gave Vulcan a thumbs up as she shut the laptop, "Alright, we'll be there soon!"

Vulcan nodded and made his way for the door, once he was out of the room, Midnight flew up to Cinder and grabbed her by the shoulders, "You are so lucky I was here to bail you out!"

Cinder frowned, "I know… I'm sorry…"

"Ugh! I can't believe you really made me do the generic ghost thing!"

"L-look, I'll make it up to you! I'll buy you anything you want!"

"Don't bother, it's not that big of a deal, besides, I already have a ton of Poké anyway."

"You do!?"

Midnight dug into her bag, pulled out a Poké coin (Again, not a Pokécoin, completely different currency there), and began tossing it up and catching it in her hand, "How else do you think I can afford to use it as ammo?"

"That's fair, but how'd you get all of it?"

"You think you're the only one to raid a criminal base?"

"I guess that's fair seeing as your mom runs the prison… Well, I guess I'll just stop asking questions and get ready."

Midnight's flame flickered once more as she beamed a bright smile Cinder's way, "Alright, I'll meet you there."

"See you!" Cinder waved.

Midnight disappeared into thin air again, leaving Cinder to her own devices, "Now let's see what I look like with dyed flames."

Cinder dug through her bag and pulled out the dye she bought earlier, "Oh, now I get it, this dye's supposed to look like how the world looked in that game that Porygon was making, that could be quite cool actually, I'd love some pixelated flames."

She pulled the dye bottle out of the box and read the instructions on it, "So first I shake it up..."

*Shake* *Shake*

"Then press down on the nozzle to spray it."

Cinder struggled to get the dye bottle to where she wanted it, that was until she heard a groggy voice from her doorway, "Need help?"

"Ah, Joseph! You sound… Uh well rested?"

Joseph shook his head and laughed a little, "I think that I pushed myself a little too hard in the game world."

"Oh, well, I'm sorry to hear that."

Joseph took the bottle from Cinder and started to read the instructions for himself, "It's fine… It's really my fault for thinking that I wouldn't feel any of it after that…"

Cinder went to make another comment, but she felt a sharp pain come from one of her flame spots, "Ow! What was that?"

"Oh, it's the dye, it's liquid… This is gonna sting a little, so just… Bear with me, ok?"

"… Alright."

Joseph continued spraying the dye on each of Cinder's flame spots, each time the dye hit her fur Cinder winced. Joseph was trying to be quick so that Cinder didn't have to suffer, but he was also trying to make sure he didn't mess things up, and being tired was definitely not helping either of those things, that being said, the final product didn't turn out to be a disaster, far from it in fact, he managed to almost perfectly apply the dye, "Wow… Didn't think it'd turn out that well, considering I feel like I could pass out at any moment…"

Cinder was struggling to contain herself, "Hold on, lemme see it for myself!"

She pulled out her mirror and flared up her quills, the flames burned a bright, pixelated red color. Cinder's smile grew wider, "Oh my gosh! They're even red! My favorite!"

Joseph tilted his head, "Red's your favorite color?"

Cinder nodded happily, "Yup, something about it just feels so powerful, is there something wrong with that?"

Joseph waved his forepaws in front of him, "N-no, there's nothing wrong with that, it's completely your opinion."

"Phew, for a moment there I thought you were gonna judge me."

"I have no room to talk, lime green is my favorite color, everyone always made fun of me for it, so I always lied and said my favorite was actually yellow because it was close enough."

"That's… Kinda a weird thing to get bullied for."

"That's what I'm saying!"

Cinder giggled as she stuffed her mirror back into her bag, "Well uh, we were gonna eat dinner at the guild, you wanna come?"

"Sure, I mean, I could go for a bite."

"Alright, then let's get going!"

February 6th, 6:25 pm

SurfSpark Guild - Empty Team Room

Coast Continent

Cinder led Joseph to the Warp Panel in the lounge, once they appeared in the guild, Joseph paused and took a look around the room, "Man, it feels like forever since I saw this room."

Cinder sighed as she began to reminisce about the short amount of time spent in this cramped, yet cozy room, "Yeah, I'd say it's a shame we didn't really get to stay in the guild for a while, but our base is so much cozier. It makes this place feel like a prison cell in comparison."

"You said it! Could you imagine if we tried to cram our entire team in here?"

"Ugh… It's enough to give me nightmares again…"

"Yeah… Let's just head out of here…"

Joseph opened the door slowly, he took one last look at the room when he noticed something familiar, there was a desk in the corner with a bottle of ink and a journal sitting on it, "Wait a sec, I still wanna grab that journal on the desk there."

Cinder was already halfway out the door when she swung her head back around, "Huh? What journal?"

Joseph responded by grabbing the journal and showing it to Cinder, "This one, it was here when we first arrived here, I wanted to write about my experience waking up here, but then I got swept up by the whirlwind that is our daily life."

Cinder giggled awkwardly as she rubbed the back of her head, "Yeah, it'd be nice for things to calm down a bit…"

Joseph stuffed the journal in his bag and walked over to the door, "We'll get some chill time… Eventually…"

"And by that you mean?"

"When Fiora's six feet under."

Cinder frowned, "I was afraid you were gonna say that."

"Yeah… We've got a long road ahead of us, but hopefully, we can look back and laugh or something…"

"I guess… Now let's just go get some food."

Joseph and Cinder walked through the halls of the guild for a while. It was a little nostalgic to be back at the guild for once, seeing as they had everything the guild had at home, for the most part anyway… After a short walk, they made it to the guild's dining hall, where a giant crystal chandelier blinded them as soon as they entered, Joseph could vaguely make out the shape of a Leavanny wearing a huge backpack through the blinding lights, "Jeez, Lanturn really turned up the brightness on that chandelier since the last time we were here." Joseph said as he covered his eyes.

Cinder's head dipped back down towards the floor as she shielded her face from the light, "Y'think!? I can barely see!"

As the pair shielded their eyes from the overpowering bright light, they tried to find where their friends were seated, after fumbling around aimlessly for a bit the light dimmed a bit as Lanturn appeared before the pair, "Hehe… Sorry about that… I must've messed up the light settings…"

Once Joseph noticed that the light was no longer as bright as the sun, he sighed and moved his paw away from his face, "Thanks, man."

Lanturn smiled as he floated up a little higher, "You're welcome!"

Cinder zoned out and looked at the chandelier, "So… Who's that in the chandelier?"

Joseph looked back at the chandelier, "Well they look… Uh… Pretty important…"

Lanturn chuckled as he placed a fin on Cinder's shoulder, "That there is Leava. She's the founder of Tangle Town in the Jungle Continent."

Joseph was getting a little tired of continents seemingly being pulled from thin air, he telegraphed this by giving Cinder a bit of an awkward side eye, "What?" Cinder asked, "Did I say something?"

Joseph shook his head, "It's more of a lack of saying something, I'll tell you when we get to the table."

"Oh, uh… A-alright?"

The pair turned their attention back to Lanturn as he flickered his lights, "Well tonight's chandelier has a purpose, it's to commemorate Tangle Town's 58th anniversary!"

Cinder pointed a nubby arm at Lanturn, "Hold on, not to like, take away from the celebration or whatever, but didn't you say all the chandeliers have some sort of symbolic purpose?"

Lanturn smiled as his antenna light grew brighter, "That I did! My favorite one has got to be the Dewott, it represents training to reach your fullest potential, I mean Dewott is often called the 'Training Pokémon' after all."

Cinder brought her hand to her chin, "Wow, I never thought of that, I kinda just assumed it was because you were expecting someone to evolve or something."

"Nah bro, I could never predict that, well unless someone bought an evolution item or something, but that's a different story. Usually, evolution is a little unpredictable, we only really know when it's about to happen when it well… Happens…"

Cinder was a little confused by this, evolution here worked very differently from her home world. Back home, Pokémon went to the Luminous Spring when they hit their evolution level or met some other condition, whereas here Pokémon seemed to just evolve, "What kinda sense does that make?" She asked.

"Well for some reason some Pokémon seem to evolve much later than others, it seems that there's an average level of evolution among a species but some folks just… Don't abide by that…"

Joseph raised an eyebrow at that, "Is that why I haven't evolved yet?"

Lanturn turned his attention to Joseph and noticed a bit of a frown on his face, "Probably, you're probably just a bit of a late bloomer, it's not a big deal though, it gives you time to decide if you want to evolve or not."

Joseph's disappointed expression faded, "That's true, I still haven't really decided on that yet."

Lanturn placed a fin on Joseph's head and gave him a noogie, "You'll figure it out eventually. It took me a while to decide too, I ended up going with this form because, well, just look at me, I'm awesome!"

Joseph chuckled and nodded, "Can't argue with that."

Lanturn smiled one final time, "Well, I've gotta go, I'll catch you two later."

Lanturn waved as he floated off, leaving Joseph and Cinder to find their table. After searching around a bit, Joseph saw Vulcan wave to him as he flared up his newly dyed flames, "Over here!"

The pair ran over to the table and caught a glimpse of Vulcan's black flames, "Woah! Those look sick!" Joseph exclaimed.

"I know right!? These flames are wicked! I don't even know black flames could exist!"

Cinder flashed a smug smile before lighting up her pixelated red flames, catching the eyes of everyone at the table, "WOAH! Those are even cooler!" Vulcan exclaimed, "You didn't tell me you were getting dye too!"

"I thought I'd surprise you."

While that was going on, Joseph took a seat next to Rory and Sammy, "Sup guys? Feels like forever since we could sit and chill like this."

Sammy held up one of his shells and waved at Joseph, "Heya Joseph! It's been way too long since we last spoke!"

"Y-yeah… Sorry about that…"

Sammy holstered his shell and shook his head, "It's fine, I mean with a team this big, it's only natural that we'd split up like this."

Joseph scanned the table and noticed everyone seemed to be here and accounted for, or so it seemed until he did a double-check and noticed Yumi was missing, "Speaking of splitting up, where's Yumi?"

Rory took a quick break from scarfing down her food to lift her face from her plate, "She's at another table, some team of bugs invited her over there."

This caught Joseph completely off guard, he knew that even though she'd gotten used to the other members of the team, she still feared Pokémon, "Huh? What happened to her being shy around other Pokémon?"

"All that went out the window the moment she got all starry-eyed around Team Jitterbug's leader, apparently she's…" Rory paused to shudder, "A fan of bugs."

Joseph was dumbfounded, "That is very strange, bugs are usually what freak people out the most."

Flint overheard Joseph and decided to chime in, "Master Yumi is a little strange in that regard, she's absolutely terrified of anything that flies, excluding bugs, and she's afraid of literally anything else, especially fire types."

Joseph rolled his eyes, "Figures that we have three of those on our team."

Flint gave a bit of a half-suppressed chuckle before continuing, "You guys got lucky that she warmed up to you so fast, otherwise she'd probably be deathly afraid of Cinder and Vulcan, and for good reason! Cinder's unpredictable and Vulcan looks like he knows how to kill anyone he meets in about 100 different ways, and that's just within 5 minutes of meeting them!"

"I can't tell if that's a compliment or an insult."

"Neither. It's an observation."

Joseph hesitantly nodded his head, "Uh huh, so uh, I assume she wasn't the biggest fan of you when you first met seeing as you have wings and all."

Flint chuckled awkwardly as he rubbed the back of his head with his wing, "Yeah, I can still hear her squeals to this day, my poor little Rowlet ears were destroyed that day."

This whole conversation got Joseph thinking, "How did you two meet anyway?"

"Oh, I was just sitting around when a Pokéball hit me on the back of my head, turns out Yumi was trying to catch a Wurmple or something, and she ended up missing her mark… By a lot…"

"I assume she didn't even realize she got you until she heard the little firework?"

Flint sighed as a sweat droplet rolled down the side of his head, "Yep… She had no idea what was inside until she found the thing." Flint's expression perked back up, "She was in luck though! Because I was definitely the best thing she could have caught!"

Rory gave Flint a confused look, "So you're just ok with the fact that she ripped you away from your friends and family?"

Flint looked down at his plate with a frown, "I uh… Didn't have either of those things… My parents were off somewhere else, and it's kinda hard to make friends in the wild, especially when you're in your early 30s."

Sammy, Rory, and Joseph were all stunned, "YOU'RE IN YOUR 30S!?"

"Yep, I get it, I'm old."

Joseph couldn't believe it, "Hold on, if you're in your 30s, then how come you were still a Rowlet when you met Yumi?"

Flint once again rubbed the back of his head, "Well… Because I was a wimp back then…"

"Oh, so that must be why you two are so close, you helped each other conquer your fears."

Flint caressed his chin with the tip of his wing, "Huh, I never really thought about that, I guess we did."

Joseph sighed as he shook his head, "Just a shame you two aren't in the clear yet, you still got a world full of fear to get through… As do I…"

Rory placed a paw on Joseph's shoulder, "It's alright though, as long as we all help each other out we'll make it through this, I know we will!"

Flint smiled a little bit as he was filled with a sense of determination, "Yeah, we'll make it through this, we just have to work together… As hard as that may be…"

That last comment raised some eyebrows, "Huh? But I thought we made a pretty good team that one time." Sammy said with a frown.

"It's not you that I'm worried about, it's Joseph."

Joseph's expression went from confused to astonished in an instant, "Huh!? Me!? But what did I do!?"

Flint planned his next move carefully, he couldn't just tell Joseph that Yumi had a crush on him, that would be weird and would fuel the 'lovebird' comments, so he had to improvise, "Shinx terrorized me when I was little so as you can imagine I'm still getting over that."

"Oh, uh, I guess I understand, sorry to hear that…"

Flint tried to continue what he was saying, but Cinder cut him off, "Attention, I have something to say!" Once Cinder had everyone's attention, she continued, "Tomorrow we're gonna go over to the Jungle Continent for a quick job."

Rory was confused, "So we're diverting our attention from the plates? Why?"

Cinder took a deep breath before putting her lie to the test, "Lanturn said that we should take a break from trying to stop whatever's going on with that void stuff and do some smaller stuff, and I wholeheartedly agree."

"But this is life or death here! We can't take too much of a break!"

Cinder rolled her eyes under her eyelids, "Says the one who spent most of the day playing in the snow."

Rory's face turned red as a tomato under her cobalt blue fur, "Uh, well, um."

"Exactly, now let me finish, we're gonna set out tomorrow to help an anonymous Pokémon with something, it doesn't sound that intense, so I think Joseph should be safe to tag along as well."

Joseph sighed, he still felt somewhat hurt from the ghostly Absol horn piercing his soul, but he didn't have the energy to argue with Cinder, "Alright, but can I ask you something?"

Cinder gave Joseph a confident look, "Shoot."

"WHERE THE HECK CAN I GET A MAP OF THIS PLACE!?"

"E-excuse me?"

"I've been here for like over a week now and the only map I've seen is the one in Lanturn's room the day I arrived! Can I please get a map? It'd be nice to know what this world looks like!"

Cinder felt a bit guilty, "I'm so sorry! I thought I told you your watch has a map on it!"

"Oh wait for real?"

Joseph looked at his watch and sure enough, the map was right in front of his face, "Crud, I had no idea, I wish I had known that earlier…"

"Well uh, now you know."

Ignoring Joseph's major overreaction, Rory decided to ask about the job, "So are we looking for something?"

"Sort of?" Cinder replied, "It's more like we're looking for someone rather than s omething."

"So it's a rescue mission?"

Cinder shook her head, "Not quite. We're supposed to gather information on them, supposedly they're a newly discovered species of Pokémon."

"So we're stalking them."

"Uh…"

"Cinder, stalking Pokémon isn't a job, it's a crime!"

"We're not stalking them! We just need to ensure that their species is properly classified y'know for ID purposes."

Rory sighed as she placed her head on the table, "Alright…" She said before jerking her head back up in an instant, "But if I find out you're lying to me, I'll… I'll…"

Rory looked to her left to see Sammy holding her arm down, "Relax, Cinder wouldn't pull anything like that, not with her standing at the guild."

"It has nothing to do with my standing! I'm completely against stalking! It's 110% morally wrong!" Cinder quickly added, "Stalking is absolutely disgusting and I think stalkers deserve to be beaten to a bloody pulp!"

"Good." Rory said, "I'm glad to see we're on the same page about that."

Cinder sighed, "Phew, I was afraid you were gonna keep trying to call me a stalker… I'm way too hungry to be arguing right now…"

Joseph's stomach rumbled, "Yeah… Same here, how about we go grab some food?"

"Yeah, let's do that."

Joseph and Cinder hopped up from their seats and set a course for where food was being served, meanwhile, everyone else continued digging into their food, well except Flint, who eyed a table in the distance, 'I hope everything's going nicely with Yumi, I was a little hesitant to let her hang out with those bugs on her own but…'

Yumi was having a great time chatting with the bugs, Flint couldn't exactly make out what they were saying or who they even were from his seat, but he could see that she was smiling and laughing, so he stopped snooping, 'She'll be fine…'

Meanwhile, at Yumi's table, she was sitting in between a Vikavolt and a Shuckle, across from them sat a Ledian, Durant, and a little Silcoon. The Silcoon had the spotlight, he was making jokes about his latest dungeon expedition, "And there I was, face to face with the world's biggest plushie, a Bewear the size of a Golurk when suddenly BLAM he slammed me on my little Wurmple head with his fist!"

Yumi was perplexed, "How did you survive?"

The Silcoon let out a bit of cocky laughter, "If you think I'm gonna let anything less than a boulder crush me, then you're wrong! I crawled out from under the beast's fist and I wrapped it up in my String Shot! And then… And then…"

Yumi couldn't take the suspense, "And then what?"

"I hit 'em with a Poison Sting barrage for the ages, and a few moments later the beast was out cold."

Yumi clapped her paws, "That was such an awesome tale! I can't believe you actually did that!"

The Silcoon tried to give a surprised expression but failed due to their cocoon restricting basically any form of non-verbal expression, "Me neither, I thought once my teammates went down that I was done for!"

The Vikavolt on Yumi's left nodded, "Yeah, we really thought so too, not to discredit you rookie but seeing as it was your first day on the job things weren't looking bright from our perspective."

"Guess you could say I'm a real hotshot for a rookie, huh."

The Ledian turned to his left to face the Silcoon, "Yeah I'd say taking on a huge Bewear all on your own and evolving afterward is enough to consider you a bit of a hotshot, I mean my Comet Punch can't hold a candle to your brilliance!"

The Silcoon laughed, "I'm flattered, really. Maybe you should try using other moves before your Comet Punch, that way you can maximize its effectiveness."

Ledian placed one of his fists under his chin, "That sounds difficult… I'll try to keep that in mind."

The bugs finished their food and got up out of their seats, once they got up, the Shuckle waddled up to Yumi and smiled, "Well, it was nice having you, but we got some business to attend to."

Yumi gave them an understanding nod, "Alright, I'll see you later!"

Yumi began walking back to her team when Shuckle shouted, "Catch you on the flip side! Oh and uh, maybe we could go exploring sometime!"

Yumi looked back over her shoulder, "That would be nice! I'd love to see your brilliance in person!"

Shuckle laughed, "Silcoon here is the only brilliant one, the rest of us are just alright at what we do."

Yumi stopped walking and turned back around, "You shouldn't be so hard on yourself, just because one of your teammates did something really cool doesn't mean that the rest of you can't do something equally insane!"

Shuckle was a little confused, as Yumi turned around and walked back to her team Shuckle was pondering what she said to him, 'Could I really do something like that? I mean, I'm the leader of this team, yet I've never been able to do anything like that, maybe… Maybe I should mix things up a bit.'

As Shuckle kept pondering, Yumi continued to walk to her team's table, on the way though she accidentally bumped into a yellow Tatsugiri, the Tatsugiri looked at her and raised an eyebrow, "What's up? You got a problem or something?"

Yumi didn't like the Tatsugiri's rude demeanor, "U-uh, no, I just bumped into you on accident, s-sorry."

The Tatsugiri's expression softened, "Ah, I see, I thought you were tryna pick a fight, and I was about to get my buddy over here."

Now it was Yumi's turn to raise her eyebrow, "Buddy?"

"Yeah, I got this big fish buddy, he's a bit of an idiot, but he listens to anything I tell him, so I guess that makes up for it."

"O-oh, ok then, I'll uh, take your word on that…"

Yumi awkwardly backed out of the conversation as she bumped into someone else when she flipped around she saw Specter smiling at her, "Sup snowy?"

Yumi sighed, "You were serious when you said you would call me that from now on?"

Specter's smile widened, "Yep! I figured since I'm not evolving into a Glaceon, someone else should bear the mantle, y'know?"

"Couldn't it have been Slippy?"

"He doesn't look as snowy as you do, besides, he's more of an ice guy."

Yumi shook her head, "Whatever… Where's everyone else?"

"They're heading back to the base, I elected to stay back and fill you in on tomorrow's mission."

"O-oh, well I'm just gonna be staying back with Joseph, so it's not important."

"He's going too, Cinder said something about this mission being light on combat."

Yumi sighed to herself, she was hoping that nothing bad happened to Joseph because if something did… "Alright, but if she's wrong on this, then I'm gonna haunt her for the rest of her days, you hear?"

Specter waved his paws around frantically, "That won't be necessary! We're gonna be fine! I promise!"

Specter started to lead Yumi to the door as they continued to banter, "We really shouldn't be risking it."

"We'll be fine, just calm down."

February 6th, 7:00 pm

Team Echoes Base - Joseph's room

Coast Continent

Yumi and Specter entered Joseph's room quietly as Joseph sat atop his bed, scribbling away in the notebook he had found in the empty team room, "Can't forget that little detail… Oh, and that memory will be living in my head rent-free for the rest of my life… What else…?"

Specter cleared his throat before shouting, "What are you doin' you nerd!?"

Joseph looked up from his book and went to retort when a purple aura enveloped it and sent it flying at Specter, the book struck him right smack in the middle of his forehead, causing him to fall over, "GAH! What the-"

Out of the blue, Midnight appeared in front of Joseph, "He's writing a biography, now quit making fun of him!"

Specter rubbed his aching forehead as he got back to his feet, "It was a joke! Ya didn't have to hit me with the book over it!"

The mischievous Lampent chuckled as another book floated up into the air beside her, "Oh, well in that case here have another!"

Specter dove out of the way as the book flew straight at him. The book just narrowly missed, landing on the floor beside him. He picked the book up and read the cover, "Oh, a joke book… Ha ha, very funny…" He huffed as he rolled his eyes, "Didn't anyone ever tell you that friendly fire won't be tolerated?"

More floating books cluttered the air around Midnight, "Really? What book was that in?"

She didn't intend on launching these books, but she didn't exactly make her intentions clear, so Joseph decided now was a good time to step in, "Ok Midnight, enough with the books."

The books all fell to the floor as the ghostly aura around them dissipated, "I wasn't gonna throw them at him, I was just teasing!"

In an instant, the books all disappeared, well except for Joseph's journal which reappeared in front of him. With the journal back in its original position, Joseph continued to scribble away with his claws. While Joseph scribbled, Specter gave Midnight a confused look, "You said he's writing a biography?"

The lamp ghost nodded her head, "Yup, he said something about wanting to write about his experience here, so I bought him some ink."

Specter's confused expression still hadn't faded, "Uh huh, so like, has he always wanted to do this, or is this like a spur of the moment kinda deal?"

Joseph opted to answer this one, "I've had my eyes on this journal since I first got here, I picked it up when we ended up back in our old room."

Specter made a clicking sound with his tongue, "Ah, gotcha."

Joseph closed the book and dipped his claws in a cup of water he had sat beside him, in an instant the excess ink washed off his claws and tainted the water, "I think I'm done writing for now, I'll come back to that in a bit."

"But you just started writing!"

"Well yeah, but I managed to get a lot down in a short time, it's crazy what staying focused can do for you."

Jeez what a showoff, uh I mean, n-never mind…

Specter walked over to Joseph and had a look at his work so far, "Jeez, this is like really long for something you just started writing."

Joseph nodded, "I told you I got a lot down."

Midnight floated up beside Joseph and placed a hand on his shoulder, "So, uh, you wanna play some games with me and Cinder now?"

"Give me a little bit, there's still something I want to do first."

Midnight blipped out of existence and reappeared at the door, "Alright! I'll let you do that. When you're ready, just give me a shout!"

"Will do, I won't be long!"

Midnight vanished once again, freeing the room from its haunting, well almost anyway, Yumi was still standing near the door, "So what were you gonna do?"

Joseph looked at his wrist, or at least what used to be his wrist, and pulled up the map on his watch, once the map was up he realized something, "Wait a sec…" He slammed his palm into his face, "I've literally used the map before! How did I forget about it!?"

Specter rolled his eyes, "You tell me, bub."

Joseph removed his palm from his face and groaned, "I would've taken a bigger look at the map sooner if I didn't completely forget about it…"

He shook his head before zooming out on the map until all that was visible were continents, "Let's see, so obviously we're on the Coast Continent so that's not that important, other than that there are 6 other major continents and a bunch of isolated islands, among the continents there are; The Jungle, Lava, Crag, Glacier, Crystal, and Plains Continents, it also lists how technologically advanced they are? Uh, ok? That's a little weird but still helpful, I guess."

Specter decided to explain that last part, seeing as he knew the reason for it, "I read somewhere that some ancient civilizations chose magic over technology while others went the other way."

He pulled a book from his bag and began reading, "The King of Old chose to look forward to the future while the Empress of Yesteryear chose to stay true to tradition, she chose to further magic's capabilities."

Joseph looked up from his watch for a moment, "Wow, that's an interesting tale, I wonder if it's real."

Specter placed the book back into his bag, "Well as far as I've seen it is. When we went to the Lava Continent, didn't you notice how many magic users there were?"

Joseph thought back to the trip to the Lava Continent, he remembered meeting with Braixen and how she had made a bunch of potions and stuff, "Oh yeah, I guess that checks out, we met Delphox's little sister while we were there."

Midnight heard her father's name and decided to pop back in, "Are you talkin' crap about my dad?"

"No no! I was just telling Specter about how we met his little sister."

"Oh, well uh, carry on then!"

Midnight disappeared once more, leaving the others to continue their conversation. Joseph closed the map on his watch, "Well that's definitely an interesting dynamic, I thought that each continent would just have one biome and that was all there was to it."

Specter nodded in agreement, "Yeah, there's a little more to it than that, besides, how boring would it be if every continent was just the same but with a different coat of paint?"

Joseph sighed, "I see your point… Well, Ima let Midnight know I'm ready to play games."

Midnight smiled as she appeared in the room once more, "I already know, I was listening through the wall the whole time."

Joseph opted not to ask about how she was doing that, instead, he opened his laptop and logged on, "So, what game are we playing?"

Midnight grabbed Joseph by the waist and prepared to drag him into the shadows, "Come on! Don't be a stranger! Let's take this into Cinder's room!"

"Wha- Hey! L-let go of me!"

"Nonsense let's go!"

Disregarding Joseph's protests, Midnight dragged Joseph into the shadows, through the ghost dimension, and into Cinder's room. Once there, the three played games for a few hours before, eventually, it got late and everyone started to get tired, so Midnight dragged Joseph back through the floor and into his room, she placed him gently onto his bed and gave him a pat on the head, "Goodnight and, uh, good luck out there tomorrow."

"'Night Midnight, thanks for helping me around and stuff."

Midnight spun around in a circle and took a bow, "It was my pleasure."

As Midnight vanished for presumably the last time tonight, Joseph curled up on his bed and let out a yawn, 'Here's hoping I don't die tomorrow…'

February 6th, 9:30 pm

Team Echoes Base - Slippy's room

Coast Continent

As everyone was winding down, Slippy was thinking about tomorrow's mission, "I wonder what kind of Pokémon we'll meet tomorrow."

He hopped over to the table in the middle of his room and looked at the drawings strewn all over it, "I'd imagine they'd be nothing like anything I've ever drawn before, let alone anything I've seen."

The Spheal paced around his room as he tried to picture this theoretical mystery Pokémon, "Maybe they'll have huge wings or sharp claws or something else really cool."

Slippy hopped back to his bed and began to lie on his back, "Well… There's only one way to find out, I guess, goodnight mama."

As Slippy drifted off, Midnight appeared in his room doing her nightly check-ins on everyone, making sure they were sleeping soundly, 'Hold on, did he just say goodnight to his mama? Why would he do that she's not-'

The realization hit Midnight like a bullet, causing her eyes to shoot wide open, 'I-I'm… I'm so sorry, S-Slippy.'

Midnight held back tears as she left the room, she never would've thought that Slippy had endured something so tragic, even if she didn't know the details she still felt terrible, 'M-maybe I should keep a closer eye on him, just in case he has a nightmare.'

Midnight floated back into the lounge and slumped down on the couch, 'I just hope he doesn't have any nightmares before I can get that Dream Eater TM…'

February 7th, 7:21 am

Team Echoes Base - Joseph's room

Coast Continent

Joseph woke up and did a stretch as per usual only to be jump scared as Yumi seemingly teleported in front of him, "Good morning Joseph!"

"GAH! Yumi! H-how'd-"

Yumi put her paws out as she gave Joseph a worried look, "O-oh, sorry, did I startle you?"

"A little, I mean it's ok though, I'm wide awake now."

Yumi frowned, "I'm sorry, I just wanted to show you that I learned how to use Shadow Sneak."

"Oh, well that's cool, just try not to scare me next time you learn a new move, I'm not sure my heart can handle it."

Yumi's frown flipped upside down as she giggled, "Noted."

The two hopped off of Joseph's bed and entered the lounge, expecting Vulcan to be cooking something already. As it turns out, though, everyone was waiting around, presumably waiting on Joseph and Yumi, "Uh, hey guys, what's going on here?"

Rory threw her bag over her shoulder and stood up, "We were waiting on you fools, now we're off."

"Wow, already!? Uh, alright then, I guess breakfast is overrated then."

Cinder butt in to explain the finer details, "We're leaving early so we can have enough daylight left to find whatever our guy wants, so we'll eat on the way there."

"Uh, alright then, let's go!"

The team started to approach the door when suddenly Cinder's bag shouted, "HOLD IT!"

Tiny popped out and landed on the floor next to Cinder, "Midnight, you can go with them, I've gotta open the box again."

Midnight appeared out of thin air once again and flickered her flame, "Open the what now?"

"Trust me, it'll make sense eventually."

"Ok, but what about the base?"

"Don't worry about that, I've got it covered, now enjoy your day out!"

Midnight smiled as she floated beside Cinder, "Alrighty then! See you later!"

The team exited the base and began climbing the vine rope down the tree one by one as Tiny waved goodbye to them, 'Hopefully, I shall regain my old strength soon, in the meantime though…' Tiny waddled back into her room, 'I've got an army to command…"

February 7th, 7:56 am

Sunset Square - Kecleon Brother's Shop

Coast Continent

Cinder led the team to the Kecleon Brothers to buy ferry tickets when they stumbled upon a familiar face, at the counter sat a Zorua buying apples, "I swear Candy's gonna evolve this time, there's no way that she can't with this many apples."

Specter was about to jump in and offer a snarky remark when something weird happened, a Pokémon had squeezed their way through the crowd and ended up beside Malachite, "Are you sure it's the number of apples that's the problem?"

Malachite quickly looked beside her to see a Lurantis standing tall. The sheer size difference between the two of them couldn't be understated, Malachite was a fairly average-sized Zorua but this Lurantis? It was a giant compared to her, it towered over her which intimidated her a little bit, "U-uh, I'm pretty sure? A friend and I tried to make an apple each, and it wasn't good enough…"

"Listen, save your money, regular old apples ain't gonna cut it, allow me to show you where to get the good stuff."

Malachite didn't like the sound of that, she started shivering as her fear grew, "T-that doesn't sound shady at all."

The Lurantis facepalmed before kneeling down to Malachite's level, placing an arm on her shoulder, "You can trust me, I might seem intimidating, but I'm really not all that bad."

"H-how do I know I can trust you?"

The Lurantis pulled his other arm to his chin as he thought for a moment, "I'll tell you what, if you ever feel threatened then you are perfectly capable of running away at any point, sound good?"

Malachite was still a little unsure, stammering a bit as she tried to muster a response, "U-u-uh u-um."

The Lurantis tried one last time to sweeten the deal enough to win over Malachite's trust, "I'll let you bring your friends if it makes you feel comfortable."

This seemed to do the trick as all signs of fear disappeared and a smile appeared on Malachite's face, "That sounds like an adventure! Count me in!"

The Lurantis returned the smile as she motioned for Malachite to follow him, "Great, let's get going then!"

The two began to skip off into the distance as Malachite cheered, "Yay! Adventure!"

However, Specter wasn't okay with the exchange that had just gone down, as he still felt the Lurantis was quite suspicious, "Wait! Don't-" He cried out before being cut short by a ghostly metallic arm being placed over his mouth.

Once she had Specter's attention, Midnight lifted her arm, "It'll be fine, I was reading that guy's mind the whole time, he wouldn't hurt a fly unless it brought him within an inch of his life first."

"Huh?"

"That guy's a complete pacifist with pure intentions, he just wants to show Malachite the nearest Perfect Apple tree."

Specter sighed heavily, "Thank Arceus… I really didn't feel like having to buy any weed killer today."

"Dang, it's like that huh, you'd really kill someone to save her, you must be pretty close."

"Look, she's had it rough, I'd hate to watch some crook take her life for any reason."

"Wouldn't killing someone land you in jail?"

Specter rolled his eyes, "Wouldn't be the first time I've been considered a criminal, you of all Pokémon should know that."

Midnight recalled when her mom brought in a (still burning) unconscious Eevee, "Heh, yeah… But wait a sec, you're really telling me you'd go back to that life all over a girl?"

"It's not even about her, it's about justice, if dishing out justice means going to jail then I'm willing to rot in a cell for the rest of my life."

"Dang, remind me never to tick you off, I feel like I'm putting myself at risk by doing so."

Specter flashed a smug smile, "Well as long as you don't do anything awful we should be fine."

The conversation was cut short when Cinder held out a bunch of ferry tickets, "Alright, it's time to go, the ferry leaves in 5 minutes."

"Five minutes!? Dude! What the heck!?"

"It's the only ones they had! Don't blame me, blame luck!"

"Ugh, I'm already doing enough of that!" Specter groaned.

Midnight rolled her eyes as the group began running, "Says the crook who was given the punishment of joining a bunch of friendly Pokémon on a team of heroes."

"Look, just shut up and ru- I-I mean float!"

The team all boarded their ride, which happened to be none other than another Wailord because what else could carry a team this fricken' big, once they were all aboard they took a seat and rode off into the sun… Rise… Yeah, that saying is not as fitting when it's still relatively early…

February 7th, 8:35 am

Open Sea

The team had been on the water for half an hour now, and nothing particularly interesting happened until Joseph suddenly felt a strange yet familiar presence in his mind, ' Human, what's going on? Why's everyone going to the Jungle Continent all of a sudden?'

Joseph thought he recognized the voice in his head, 'Mesprit? Is that you?' He thought as he peered into the water.

Sure enough, Mesprit was under the water dropping in on Team Echoes, ' Yep, now are you gonna answer me or not?'

'Jeez, give me a sec! We're taking a little intermission to do some guild work, we'll be back to looking for plates before you know it.'

' I sure hope so, any moment you're not looking for plates is a moment you're allowing those two freaks to grab them.'

'I get that, I'm actually 99% sure that we all get that, it's just we can't always be searching for them, it'd be too taxing.'

Mesprit didn't really think about the fact that mortals could also get tired just as she could, ' Oh yeah… Y'know, I kinda forgot getting tired wasn't just a byproduct of being over the age of 1000.'

Joseph was a little confused about how the goddess of emotion could forget something about mortals considering she had a hand in giving them life, but he decided to look past that and ask about something else, 'Uh, ok? So why are you following us?'

' Oh, I was checking up on Mew, he's been off on his own ever since the human traitor incident, he hasn't spoken to Arceus since, I think I'm the only one he's really talked to since, and he keeps pushing me away too… I worry about him sometimes…'

'So the fact that Fiora betrayed the gods didn't sit well with Mew?'

Mesprit's expression darkened as she shifted positions under the water, ' Yup, and unfortunately he isn't the only one who doesn't trust Arceus anymore, Giratina hasn't been around either…'

Joseph frowned, 'Dang… Must suck to have what are effectively your kids disown you.'

' If I'm being honest, I can't say I blame them for being distrusting of Arceus either, I tried to warn him that this was a huge gamble, hell, trusting you is an even bigger one given things didn't pan out with Fiora.'

'Why are you choosing to bank on it then?'

' I'm- not exactly sure, I guess I really haven't learned my lesson.'

Joseph thought back to when Mesprit tested him, she seemed so skeptical of humanity, and rightfully so, but she was still willing to give them another shot, did she really see a glimmer of hope within him, 'I swear I'll do everything in my power to prove to you that you made the right choice.'

' You better, otherwise I'll send you to a post-apocalyptic version of whatever world you came from.' Mesprit paused to wink under the water, ' No pressure.'

Joseph chuckled nervously, 'Right… Ehehehe…'

Sammy heard Joseph's audible chuckling and decided to ask him if everything was alright, "Hey Joseph? You're not going stir-crazy, are you?"

Mesprit sunk down lower into the water, ' Well that's my cue, I'll see you later human.'

As Mesprit disappeared, Joseph turned around and rubbed the back of his head, "Nope! I'm fine, I was just chatting with a friend."

"Huh? But you weren't talking." Sammy said as he continued to look at Joseph like he was crazy.

Midnight decided to cover for Joseph here, "I was sensing some serious psychic energy, I take it Mesprit was somewhere nearby."

Joseph pointed at Midnight, "Yep! She asked me what we were doing, so I decided to fill her in, in exchange she told me some stuff about the legendary Pokémon in this world."

Specter closed a magazine he was reading and faced Joseph, "Well, go on, spill, what did she say?"

"I can't say here, I'll spill when we're back home."

Specter turned back around and opened the magazine back up, "Pfft, lame, there go my plans of gaining intel on those geezers."

Rory glared at Specter, "Why would you need intel on them? You're reformed, aren't you?"

Specter huffed, "Gosh, get your head out of the gutter, I'm not gonna become a god slayer or anything, I just want to know what to get them when I inevitably apologize for Fiora's misdeeds!"

Rory backed off as a guilty frown appeared on her face, "O-oh, s-sorry for immediately assuming the worst."

Sammy stepped in and justified Rory's actions, "To be fair though, this is the first we're hearing about this plan so can you exactly blame her for jumping to conclusions."

Specter shrugged and shook his head, "Guess not, sorry, I'll be a bit more open going forward."

The rest of the ride was smooth sailing from that point, the team talked about whatever came to their minds during the trip while Slippy stared into the water, their conversations were white noise to him as he was deep in thought, 'I wonder who put that job on the board, I thought looking for a mystery Pokémon was cool enough on its own, but then I remembered Cinder said that the client was anonymous too, gosh, the anticipation's killing me!'

Slippy's train of thought was cut short by the ferry stopping, "Land ho! We've arrived at the Jungle Continent!"

February 7th, 9:32 am (Based on Coast Continent time)

Tangle Town

Jungle Continent

Slippy stopped dwelling and began moving toward the land, once he and his team had set foot on the soil they took in the scenery, thick foliage caked most of the surrounding area, there was however a small civilization built right in the middle of it all, it was a little primitive at a first glance until Cinder pointed something out, "Those houses have automatic sliding doors!"

The group stared in awe as some random citizen entered their house through a sliding door, "Wow, I wasn't expecting technology here." Joseph said, "The last exotic place we visited didn't have such luxuries."

Cinder sighed, "Yeah… But it was cool, seeing magic used in ways I could never have even imagined."

"I guess…" Joseph replied as he surveyed the area, "So you think this is Tangle Town?"

Specter pulled out his watch and checked the map, "Yep, this is it, just had to make sure this place wasn't just an eerily similar town in the jungle. I was looking at pictures on the ride here."

Rory pounded her fists together, "Alright then let's find our mystery 'mon and get this job over with."

"Yeah, what she said!" Specter reiterated.

The team walked around what seemed to be a residential area for a bit, taking in more of the scenery, there were plenty of grass type Pokémon about having casual conversations and such while a few flying types sat on the vines as if they were power lines, the birds were discussing more pressing matters like the looming threat of the strange void goo, which at this point was only a minor concern to anyone fortunate enough to not come into contact with it. That aside, nobody could seem to find their guy, that was until they were approached by someone, "Excuse me? Would you all happen to be part of one of those 'guild teams' I've been hearing about?"

Rory pivoted and did a complete 180, she saw a lone Swadloon hiding under its leaf blanket, "Yeah we are. I'm Rory, leader of Team Echoes, you need something?"

The Swadloon sighed in relief, "Good, you all got my request. Could you follow me? I wish to discuss this more privately."

"Um, ok, lemme round everyone up first."

Rory gathered her friends and met back up with the client, who seemed rather uneasy, "I-is this everyone?"

"Yup, sorry, we're a bit of a bigger team, somehow we just keep making friends."

"I-it's fine, I-I'm a little shy, but I can handle it."

"Great! Then let's get going!"

The Swadloon waddled on as they led a small mob to their home in the thick jungle, they constantly checked for passersby as they walked, which didn't sit right with some of the members of Team Echoes, ' Hey does anyone else get really bad vibes from this guy? He keeps checking his surroundings for other Pokémon.' Midnight asked, using her telepathy to her advantage.

Specter shook his head, 'This ain't no crook, that's for darn sure, but I can't deny they are a bit suspicious.' If anyone could spot a crook, it'd be Specter.

Midnight wasn't so sure, however, ' How can we be so sure?'

'They look too inexperienced to try something when there's this many of us, they probably would've just called it quits when they saw our party size, y'know?'

' I guess… But what if they're stupid?'

'Then they won't have a plan for when we get to their place, simple as that, we'll just trash them and move on.'

Specter was ripped out of his thoughts as he bumped into the star on Joseph's tail, he immediately flipped around, "Dude watch where you're goin'!"

"Why'd you stop!?"

Rory turned to face Specter and gave him a somewhat dirty look, "'Cuz we're here, ya dweeb!"

"O-oh, sorry, I was talking with Midnight with telepathy, I must've zoned out."

Specter looked over Joseph's shoulder to see a somewhat dilapidated bunker-looking structure that led underground. Team Echoes followed the Swadloon into its home and immediately sensed something was off, tubes containing strange colored liquid lined each wall as if this were some strange evil science lab, "Uh, m-maybe you were right Midnight, this place gives me the creeps." Specter said as he began to shiver intensely.

Sammy drew one of his shells, "Agreed, something's off."

The Swadloon chuckled to itself, "You got me, I've been hiding something from you all…"

Suddenly, the Swadloon threw its leaf cloak across the room, revealing its true form, "M-MEW!?" Cinder gasped.

"What the hell!?" Specter shouted as he stumbled back, "This is definitely some kind of trick! We need to-"

Specter stopped screaming as he noticed a cup of tea in Mew's hand, "Now that introductions are out of the way, how's about I explain all this over a nice cup of hot tea?"

"U-uh… That sounds nice…"

"Alright, but uh one more thing before we begin here…" Mew said as they floated over to the group. Mew grabbed Joseph and Yumi by their neck scruffs and turned into a Dusknoir, "You're only still alive because Mesprit put in a good word, so don't make me regret this."

Cinder was getting flashbacks to an eerily similar event where an eerily similar Dusknoir similarly grabbed her old friends, "H-hey! You put them down!" She shouted.

Mew transformed back into themselves and tilted their head as they gently dropped the humans back onto the floor, "Sorry, I got a little carried away there, I didn't mean to trigger anyone's PTSD or anything."

"W-wait, you know about that!?"

"Yup! I scanned your memories while we were walking. I gotta say, you're an interesting bunch."

Sparkles appeared in Specter's eyes, he was amazed by the sheer strength of Mew's psychic power, "Wow!" And then he realized that was completely a breach of privacy, "Gross!"

"Yeah, next time, ask before you snoop around in our heads!" Rory barked.

"Hehe… Sorry… I'll consider it next time."

Flint crossed his wings, "Look, you're making a very poor first impression so far, but I'm willing to forgive you if you can make some half-decent tea."

"Oh, y-you actually want tea? Usually, everyone opts to skip tea time."

The rest of the group talked it over briefly before agreeing, "Tea please!"

"O-oh well, um, give me a few minutes."

Mew teleported off somewhere, leaving everyone else waiting patiently for their tea to arrive, in the meantime however Mesprit appeared in Mew's place, "Mew I'm here! Do you want to fill me in over a cup of-"

Mesprit cut herself off when she noticed Mew was missing and Team Echoes was here, "WHAT IN ARCEUS' NAME ARE YOU DOING HERE!?"

Flint's eyes shot wide open, "Uh, we were just… Waiting on tea?"

Mesprit's expression grew angrier as she floated closer to the team, she looked as if she was about to snap when Cinder stepped in, "Look! We had no idea we'd be here either! We took a job from an anonymous poster. Come to find out, Mew was pretending to be some random Swadloon!"

Mesprit was confused, "What would Mew need you all for anyway?"

"Well, according to the job listing, they found a newly discovered Pokémon."

At that moment, Mesprit remembered, "Oh yeah… Mew said something about that when they invited me over… Huh…"

Rory snapped at Mesprit, "Exactly! Now get off our case!"

"Well, I'm sorry, I was told that any mortal that came here would be stuffed into one of those weird test tubes!"

That last comment didn't sit right with Joseph, "So Mew is against Arceus bringing humans here, but they're perfectly fine with conducting illegal experiments in their basement?"

"Well DUH, Arceus prides himself on being the creator of all life on this planet, so naturally the best way to rebel against him is to challenge that."

Stumpy approached one of the test tubes and shivered, "S-so, they made this weird creature to 'get back' at Arceus."

"Yeah, they did- wait there's something in the tube?"

Everyone turned their attention to the tube, once Joseph got a good look at the creature inside his heart skipped a beat and his knees grew weak, "Th-th-that's-"

"A really strange looking Pokémon, where'd Mew find one like this?" Mesprit interjected as Joseph struggled to find his words.

Midnight tapped the glass, "I'm getting crazy psychic readings from this guy, just what is it?"

Yumi started flipping through her Pokédex, "I-I've never seen anything like it, it's honestly scary!"

Sammy was going to throw his hat into the ring and give his own two cents about the creature, but then he noticed Joseph was trembling, "Uh, Joseph? You feeling alright buddy?"

Joseph resisted the urge to pee his nonexistent pants and run away with his tail between his legs, "I-I th-think Mew's gone a little too far."

"Huh? What do you mean?"

Joseph eyed the creature in the tube again, "Humanoid build, long tail that probably has janky hitboxes, whitish pink and purple color scheme, three finger hands, and that weird part on the back of its neck that connects its head to its back, yep, there's no doubt in my mind, that's Mewtwo."

Sammy raised an eyebrow, "Mew… Two? As in, like a second one?"

Cinder jumped in before Joseph could answer, "You mean that weird cave dweller Pokémon that nobody seems to know anything about? The one that sends challenge letters claiming he's the 'strongest life form' and that he's 'undefeatable', that one?"

Joseph nodded hesitantly, "Y-yep, that one."

Cinder burst out laughing, "Dude, you seriously believe all that crap? He's just an edgy tween who was blessed with the body of a rare species, it's not like any of those claims are true."

Cinder's laughter did nothing to ease Joseph's nerves, "Cinder, this thing if given the chance, will tear us apart, kill its creator, and probably do a much better job at destroying the world than Fiora, all on world record pace, be thankful it's behind that glass."

Joseph's stern tone made Cinder's smile fade in an instant, "Wait, are you serious?"

Joseph nodded, "Remember how I said that Pokémon were fictional where I was from? Well, in almost every form of media Mewtwo was created with the sole purpose of being the strongest Pokémon in the world, it was created by using Mew's DNA and altering it to bring out its strongest attributes, at least I think that's how that works, I'm not a mad scientist."

Mesprit floated up behind Joseph and peeked over his shoulder, "So Mew must've used their own DNA, but why would they need this 'Mewtwo'?"

"Oh, that's an easy one!"

Everyone flipped around to see Mew smiling, holding a tray of tea in their paws, "I just wanted a friend that I could actually trust, not that I don't trust you Mesprit, it's just you're still connected to Arceus, and I'm still a little uncomfortable with that."

Rory looked almost offended, "So you decided making a monster was the best way to remedy your loneliness!? What kind of screwed-up logic is that!?"

"He's not a monster! Just because the Mewtwo Joseph mentioned is a monster doesn't mean mine will be!"

Mesprit floated up to Mew, only stopping when they were about a few inches of each other's faces, "I think the mortals have a very solid point here, creating the most powerful life form isn't exactly the smartest solution here."

"Ok, but you do realize if something does go wrong I can just put him back, right?"

Mesprit rolled her eyes, "And if that doesn't work?"

"Then I'll take him out! I mean, I put him into this world, it stands to reason that I can take him out of it if need be."

Midnight went to say something when the glass tapped back, causing all the color in her eyes and her flame to fade as she tensed up, "D-d-did it just knock on the g-g-glass?"

A sweat droplet rolled down Mew's head as they sighed, "Let's just drink our tea and get on with what I actually brought you all here for."

Sammy pointed a shell at Mew as he objected, "Hold on! I don't think we can just skim past-"

However, Flint walked over to Mew and grabbed a cup of tea, "Cheers."

"WHAT!? YOU'RE JUST GONNA ACCEPT THE TEA LIKE IT'S NOTHING!?"

Flint took a sip of his tea and exhaled, "It's not my problem if this maniac gets loose, by that time Yumi and I will have been long gone."

"Didn't we just discuss your rudeness!?"

"It's just the truth, besides, I have faith that this Mewtwo will be obedient and listen to its creator."

Sammy was going to yell again when Mesprit stepped in, "It won't be the truth when I bring you back here and make Mewtwo your problem."

You could almost hear glass shattering as the color faded from Flint's eyes, "U-uh wh-what I meant to say was, w-we'll help if we're still around y'know? Heh heh…"

"Much better, now let's have some tea."

Mew distributed tea to everyone, and they began sipping away, between sips Specter decided to ask, "So, why did Arceus give you the power to mess with reality?"

Mesprit turned her attention to the Eevee, "What do you mean?"

"Y'know, how he gave you the power to bring things here from other worlds and stuff."

"Oh, that's… A bit of an awkward story…"

Specter set his teacup down and tilted his head, "Huh?"

Mesprit shook her head as if to say to leave it there, but Mew had other plans, "Arceus was trying to hook her up with Palkia."

Mesprit's face turned as red as a tomato, "MEW! What did I say about telling everyone that!?"

"Hey, at least this time, I'm not telling a maniac who's gonna try to end the world."

Mesprit cut her eyes at Mew, "Oh yeah because that makes everything ok."

Mew covered their snout with their paws as they laughed, "Sorry, I couldn't help myself! Seeing your face turn as red as Groudon's is priceless!"

Mesprit rolled her eyes, "You're lucky I don't hate you like I do most other legendaries."

Specter interrupted the two with another question, "You hate the other legendaries?"

"Somewhat," Mesprit responded, "Most of them are just annoying."

Mew started to fake cough, "The bird trios, Palkia, Arceus, the list goes on."

Mesprit rolled her eyes, "Couldn't have said it better myself, I wish I could just stay here with you, but nooo, Arceus just has to keep me living in the stupid, overcrowded temple for some stupid reason."

Mew giggled, "That gives me an idea."

"Well go on, spill it then."

"If this whole thing with this human also backfires, you could use it as an excuse to move out."

Mew must've slapped Mesprit in the back of the head with a Nasty Plot TM because she started grinning as she gave Joseph a bit of a side eye, "Y'know, that doesn't sound half bad. Joseph, how do you feel about taking after Fiora a bit and turning to the dark side?"

Joseph rolled his eyes and sighed, even if this was a joke it was still in awful taste, "I'm not committing mass murder so you can move, besides if Arceus found out you were behind it, he'd just smite you or something and move on with his life."

Mesprit shrugged, "Oh well, it was worth a shot, I guess."

Flint emptied his teacup and set it back down slowly, his stress fading as the cup reached the ground, "Thanks for the tea, I've been really stressed lately and that really hit the spot."

Mew set their cup down after sipping their tea, "It's my pleasure. Now, are we ready to discuss how we're doing this?"

Joseph went to respond when he was interrupted by a loud, "EEK!" Followed by, "S-sorry, the tea was a little hot."

Joseph gave Stumpy a few pats, "It's alright bud, just let it cool down a bit before taking another sip."

Stumpy debated taking Joseph's advice before realizing, "Oh yeah! I'm a dragon! Why does it matter if it's a little hot!?"

He then proceeded to down the rest of the tea in one sip before slamming the teacup down. This action took Joseph by surprise, "I guess that works too."

Joseph took another sip of his tea when he set his cup back down he heard Mew start to explain the plan, "So I was thinking we could break up into groups and split up around the outskirts of town."

Rory hummed before throwing in her own two cents, "Wouldn't it be better to move further out? I mean, I doubt this Pokémon would be hanging around town if they were some undiscovered species."

Mew used their psychic power to bring a blurry picture into their hands, "This is a picture I was able to take, it's quite frankly terrible, but it's all we got to go off of, as you can clearly see though it was taken not too far from town."

Rory rolled her eyes, "Yeah, that's about the only thing I can clearly see in that picture."

Joseph looked at the picture, he could almost hear Professor Oak mocking the one who took the shot, "Yeah, Rory does have a point, this only really shows us what color we're looking for."

Mew lowered their head, "Well at least it narrows our options down a bit, there are only so many floating purple Pokémon in these parts, so we shouldn't have that tough of a time."

Sammy grabbed the picture and took a look for himself, "Well at least we have a vague idea of what we're looking for, so how are we doing groups?"

Rory cleared her throat, "I'll take Joseph, Slippy, and Sammy."

Cinder chimed in, "Vulcan and I will look after Stumpy for you, Joseph."

"And I'll be going with them." Midnight interjected.

"That just leaves Flint, Yumi, and me," Specter said, "Unless Mesprit and Mew wanna tag along with us."

Mew shook their head, "Nope, we're gonna be searching on our own, we'll contact you via telepathy if we see anything."

Cinder gave Mew a thumbs-up before holding one of her wrists up, showing off her watch, "Sounds good, we'll use our watches to call each other in case we see something as well."

"Alright then, let's split up!"

February 7th, 11:14 am (Based on Coast Continent time)

Tangle Town Outskirts

Jungle Continent

After leaving Mew's lab home, Joseph and his group set up outside Tangle Town as they were instructed to do, once they were stationed, they came to a bit of a realization, "So uh, now what?" Sammy asked.

Joseph shrugged, "I guess we just wait."

Just as Sammy feared, nobody really knew what to do other than sit around and wait, that was until Rory let out a deep breath, "Thank Arceus we're out of that creepy lab now."

"Agreed, and I thought the IDPK lab would be the scariest lab I'd see in my life, boy was I wrong."

Rory shivered, "I hate to use the A word here, but my aura senses were going crazy the whole time we were there."

That brought an idea into Joseph's mind, "I hate to burden you, but do you think you could sense the aura of our mystery man here?"

Rory was thrilled by the idea of using the 'gift' that her species had given her, and by that I mean she absolutely loathed the idea, "Ugh… Do I have to?"

Joseph shook his head, "I mean, you don't have to, but it would make things about a hundred times easier if you did."

Rory thought about it for a moment when she was yanked out of her thoughts by Sammy, "Come on Rory, using your aura-sensing abilities once isn't the end of the world, besides, if we get this over with we can go back to playing in the snow when we get back."

" Ugh… Fine! I'll do it!"

Rory closed her eyes and took a deep breath, bringing her paws toward her chest spike while doing so, suddenly blue aura flames appeared around Rory. Joseph turned to his friends, "Is it working?"

Sammy shrugged while Slippy gave a confused look, "Not sure." The two concluded.

And as suddenly as the flames appeared, they left, once they had dispersed Rory opened her eyes, "I didn't sense anything out of the ordinary, looks like we're gonna have to wait around after all."

Slippy frowned, "That's a shame… I was really looking forward to meeting this mystery Pokémon, so I could draw them a little picture."

"I'm with ya on that." Joseph groaned, "I'm not a huge fan of waiting around for a whole lot of nothin' either."

Sammy placed one of his shells on the ground and began to lie down, using the shell as a pillow, "Well, I'm gonna take a nap, wake me up if anything interesting happens."

"Alright…" Rory sighed, "Hopefully everyone else isn't just planning on napping all day, otherwise we might be back here tomorrow too."

Joseph plopped down and rolled on his back as he began to stare at the clouds through the trees, "I doubt Cinder's gonna be loafing around, she's not one to sleep on the job."

Rory lay down beside Joseph and got comfy, "That's true, I guess, although I have a feeling that this job's an exception."

Joseph chuckled, "Yeah, this one is a bit of a snore fest."

Meanwhile

Cinder was sweating intensely, 'What if we find the alien before Mew's mystery mon? Or worse, what if we don't find either of them!?'

Vulcan peeked over his shoulder and noticed Cinder's stressed-out expression, "You alright sis?"

"I'm fine, I'm just worrying about stuff that doesn't matter."

"Like what?"

"Well, y'know, I was worried that our guy might attack us or something."

"Well, Mew didn't say anything about them being aggressive or anything, so I think we're good on that front."

Cinder checked the time on her watch, "Man, time really feels slower when you're not really doing anything, right guys?"

A few seconds passed with no response, that was until Stumpy started snoring. Cinder turned around and saw that not only was Stumpy sleeping, but Midnight had landed on his back and was also just snoozing away, "GUYS! WAKE UP! WE'VE GOT A JOB TO DO-"

Cinder turned to see Vulcan placing a paw on her shoulder, "Let them sleep, we've got time until our guy shows up."

"But what if-"

"It'll be fine, just let them rest, it'll ease their nerves a bit."

That last part echoed in Cinder's mind, "Well now that you mention it, I wouldn't mind easing my nerves a bit, but I can't, if I did, we could miss something, and if that happens then what would Lanturn think!?"

Vulcan placed a digit on his lips, "Shhh, don't worry, I'll take care of things, nobody has to know."

"But what if someone does know?"

"Then I could always lie and say they knew a sleep-inducing move or something."

"Genius! Alright then! Nap time!"

Vulcan chuckled as Cinder cuddled up next to Stumpy, "You're welcome, sis."

As Cinder dozed off, Vulcan kept watch, occasionally adjusting his eyepatch to keep comfy, "Alright this is getting boring, I'm gonna check in with Specter."

Vulcan borrowed Cinder's watch for a moment and called Specter, when he picked up Vulcan started an awkward yet friendly conversation, "Uh, hey Specter, uh how are things with you?"

"Things are alright, anything up with you?" Specter asked.

"Nope, Cinder was feeling a little stressed, so I told her she could take a nap."

"Huh, I should've thought of that myself," Specter said. He looked back at his teammate for a second and then back at the watch, "Yumi and Flint are just taking in the sights I guess, although there's not really much to look at here, just a mess of green and brown."

"That's a little strange…"

"I know, what's even weirder is that Flint seems totally chill right now, this is like the calmest he's been since we've met him."

"I wonder why that is?"

Just then, Vulcan heard Flint's voice, "I feel… At home here… It's odd… This place is nothing like Hisui, yet… It almost feels more like home than home does."

"That's odd," Vulcan thought, "You don't seem like you come from a jungle."

"Yeah, I think it's more about the plant life here rather than the biome or whatever, my homeland doesn't really have any thick jungles like this."

"I guess that makes sense."

Specter took the spotlight once again as he spoke up, "Well there you have it I guess, the plant bird likes plants, who could've guessed."

Vulcan chuckled awkwardly, "Well I shouldn't hold you all up too long, I'll call you back when I've got something."

"Alright then, peace out, man."

"See ya."

Vulcan hung up the call and placed his sister's watch back on her wrist, once that was done he moved back into his lookout spot and continued looking. Nothing seemed amiss until he heard a rustle in a nearby bush. Vulcan locked in on the bush, waiting to shoot flames at whatever popped out if necessary. What he wasn't expecting to see however was a small purple Pokémon float out of the bush, its head had three spikes with the middle one being much larger than the other two, and its eyes were a bright cyan, they were so bright in fact that they seemed to give off a little light. The creature opened its mouth briefly to reveal that the inside of its mouth glowed just like its eyes did.

"Th-that's a-"

Vulcan cut himself off as he began to quake with fear, his heart rate spiked as the world around him grew blurry, "I-i-it's-"

But before Vulcan could string together a cohesive thought he collapsed on the spot, causing the creature to gasp as they heard him hit the floor, they floated over to him quickly to take a look, "¿sᴉɥʇ op I pᴉp ˙snoᴉɔsuoɔun ǝq oʇ sɯǝǝs ʇᴉ ʇnq 'ɯɹoɟǝɟᴉl ǝƃuɐɹʇs ɹǝɥʇouɐ ǝʞᴉl sʞool ʇI ¿sᴉɥʇ sᴉ ʇɐɥM ¿ɥnH"

The alien's tongue was, well, alien, sort of anyway, if you listened real closely you could maybe piece together what it was saying.

…

Alright, fine, I'll translate it for you: "Huh? What is this? It looks like another strange lifeform, but it seems to be unconscious. Did I do this?"

The alien started to inspect Vulcan closely, it picked him up and propped him up on a tree so it could get a better look at him, "It looks so strange, what are these spots on its head?"

They went to touch the flame spot on Vulcan's head, only to jerk their arm back as flames erupted from the spot, "⍙⍜⏃⊑! What was that!?"

The flames died down after a moment as the alien took a deep breath, "So this specimen is capable of conjuring fire, how very interesting, I'm sure the professor would love to hear about this."

The alien reached into their bag, pulled out a notepad, and began scribbling away, making sure to sketch Vulcan as well as write up a brief description of his findings. They were making pretty good progress until suddenly they heard what sounded like someone waking up. They flipped around to see what appeared to be a smaller version of the creature they were documenting, it seemed to be startled by their presence.

Cinder stared at the alien in shock, "H-holy crap, there really is an alien invasion!"

Now it was the alien's turn to start freaking out, "EEK!"

"D-don't worry! I-I'm not gonna hurt you unless you hurt me!"

Cinder was quite possibly the most scared she had ever been in her entire life, she wasn't even necessarily sure why either, nothing usually scared her, yet it felt like she was staring a fate worse than death straight in the glowy blue eyes. She debated calling for backup, but she decided against it, 'If I do that then everyone's gonna start freaking out, but what if it attacks me? Or worse, what if it abducts me and takes me to some sort of alien lab or something?'

The alien saw that Cinder was shivering and decided to try to calm her down and interview her properly, that way he could have something nobody at his university could ever dream of having: a description of an otherworldly species as told by the creature itself. They floated over to Cinder slowly to show they meant no harm and once they were close enough they landed back on the ground and took a seat, "Greetings, could I ask you a few questions about yourself?"

Cinder raised her eyebrow as her shivering intensified, 'Wh-what does it want from me?'

It was then the alien realized that Cinder had spoken a little differently than they had, once they came to that realization they cleared their throat and tried again, "Salutations, I was wondering if you could tell me a little about yourself, maybe give me like a little autobiography or something to that effect."

Cinder's shivering grew less intense as she looked the alien in the eyes, "Uh, a-alright? This isn't gonna end with you using me for weird alien experiments, is it?"

The creature laughed, "Nope, just my university studies, that's all."

The sudden normalcy of the situation was almost enough for Cinder's ruby-colored eyes to shoot wide open, "A school paper? You mean you came from another world so that you could write a school paper?"

"Well, I wasn't intending on it, but you see the opportunity sort of fell into my lap…" The glowy-eyed beast said, "...And then it kinda… Forced me to take it? If that makes sense."

"Could you elaborate?"

The glowstick-eyed monster nodded happily as they obliged, "You see, I was born and raised in a place called Ultra Prism Valley, it's a small village outside the big city, I was on a short break from uni when suddenly an Ultra Wormhole sucked me up and spat me out here, I was a little afraid at first, but then I realized that this would be an amazing opportunity to conduct a study. I mean, how cool would it be to make a presentation about another world entirely?"

"I guess that sounds cool, but would anyone believe you?"

"Of course, they would! I've got sketches and pictures as proof!" The Ultra Beast pulled their pencil closer to their page, "Now if you don't mind, I'd like to add that interview to my list of evidence."

"S-sure, my name is Cinder, Cinder the Cyndaquil, I'm a fire type Pokémon who loves to explore and fight my way out of tough situations."

Cinder's interviewer scribbled away as she talked about her life, she talked about her friends from Team ShinyStar, then her encounter with Nail on her first day in this world, and finally about her experience traveling with Team Echoes and her feelings about having to join a new team. It was then that the interviewer asked, "What inspired the name 'Team Echoes'? Did you just like the sound of it? Or was there something deeper?"

Cinder thought about it for a moment, 'Well now that he mentions it, I guess there is a bit of a bigger reason behind it.'

"I guess it was because of the similarities between my old team and my new one," Cinder said, "My old team had four main members, a Shinx, a Lucario, a Spheal, and me, and my new team was formed by a Shinx, a Lucario, a Spheal, and me. You starting to see where this is going?"

"Ah, I see," The purple Pokémon responded, "So you named the team 'Echoes' because you were reminded of your old team, that's interesting… Well, regardless, I think your team name has a nice ring to it."

Cinder giggled, "Thanks! I didn't think anyone else would like it."

"You're welcome." The beast said with a radiant smile, like seriously their face was glowing, "Oh! How rude of me, I forgot to give you my name! My name's Xenon, Xenon the Poipole, but you can call me Z if that's easier."

"Hold on, Xenon? How would you even spell that?"

Xenon wrote his name down on his notepad, he then presented the notebook to Cinder, "Oh, it's traditionally spelled like this, but given you speak a different language here it's probably spelled like this." Xenon flipped the book back around and wrote his name again, this time in footprint runes, he then showed the book to Cinder again.

" Ah, so that's an X, not a Z, but then why is your nickname Z?"

"Because it makes the Z sound, so Z makes more sense as a nickname."

"I see… Well, did you have any more questions?"

The Poipole thought for a moment, "Drat! I'm blanking…" That was when his lack of ideas gave him a great idea, "Hey, do you have a communicator?"

Cinder's brow furrowed, "A communicator? What do you mean by that?"

"Think of a device that lets you talk over long distances."

Cinder's eyes immediately slid over to her watch, "Oh! Yeah! I do! Do you want to register me?"

A smile appeared on Xenon's face as he pulled out something that resembled a tablet, "That would be great! That way, if I think of anything else to ask you, I can just do it!"

"Alright, well if you find a way to do it go ahead."

Xenon eagerly snatched Cinder's watch off her wrist and began inspecting it for a moment, "Wow, this looks rather primitive, lemme see what I can do."

He set the watch on the ground and got to work, "Let's see, I think I can fit this part in here… Uh, yup! Oh, this part simply won't do! Gotta replace this… Annnnd done! Here ya go!"

He tossed the watch back to Cinder, she strapped it back onto her wrist and turned it back on. She noticed a few new icons on her watch's home screen as she booted it back up, "What's this icon?"

"Oh, it's a translator! I installed it onto the microphone when I was working my magic! It should be able to translate anything into your native tongue. Oh, and the other icon is a camera, I managed to fit a few tiny little cameras in there, now you can take pictures and stuff!"

Cinder was a little overwhelmed, here she thought Xenon would just be registering his number into her watch's contacts list but nope, she got a full-on upgrade free of charge, "N-not to be rude or anything but was that really necessary?"

"Absolutely! Well, sort of anyway, I installed something in there that should let us contact each other regardless of distance, that way, once I make it back we can keep in touch, though the other mods were just for funsies."

"Oh, well, thanks for the upgrade, I guess."

"You're welcome!"

Cinder opened the camera app, took a photo of herself, and sent it to her new friend, he received the photo on his tablet and showed it to Cinder, "Yup, got your message, we're all set."

"Alright then, well it was nice meeting you-"

Suddenly a loud shout could be heard from behind Xenon, "GET AWAY FROM MY SISTER YOU ALIEN FREAK!"

Cinder looked over Xenon's shoulder and noticed that Vulcan had woken up and was about to pulverize her new friend with his frying pan, "WAIT VULCAN DON'T!"

Cinder jumped in the way, protecting her new friend, confusing Vulcan, "Cinder what are you doing!?"

"This little guy's my friend! He's an explorer just like me, he's just a different kind of explorer!"

"What's gotten into you!? You're saying that alien's your friend!? What kind of mind control does this monster have you under!?"

Xenon peeked over Cinder's shoulder, "May I ask what exactly is going on here?"

"YOU!"

"EEK!"

"You did something to her, didn't you!? You have her under your spell, don't you!?"

"I don't know what you're talking about!" Xenon squeaked as he hid behind Cinder, "We were just having a friendly conversation!"

"I DON'T BUY THAT FOR A MOMENT!"

Vulcan's frying pan came crashing down, but before it could make contact, a purple aura overtook it and threw it onto the ground behind him. Midnight had woken up and decided to intervene, "Vulcan! Stand down! They are not your enemy!"

Vulcan looked down at his frying pan for a moment before looking back at Midnight, "Are you CRAZY!? That's an alien! If we don't kill it who knows what creepy experiments it's gonna use us for!?"

Xenon covered his mouth, trying desperately to contain his laughter. He ultimately failed, letting out a roar of laughter. Once he had stopped laughing, he wiped a tear from his eye before floating out from behind Cinder, "I think you're overreacting, I'm not gonna hurt you or experiment on you, I was actually just going around studying this world so that I could write about it for my college professor."

"College? You mean to tell me you aliens go to college?" Vulcan questioned.

"Yep, I go to Prism University, we study all kinds of things, but I'm mostly interested in the more sciencey stuff like environmental studies and tech classes and stuff."

"Really, what kind of tech? Deathrays? UFOs? Brain scramblers?"

The Poipole rolled his eyes before pulling his tablet back out, he then showed Vulcan a bunch of technology from his home world, there were things like VR simulations, a Food Cloner, and a Warp Panel Remote for teleporting to warp panels from a distance, he got a bit carried away and started going on and on about all the latest and greatest tech that Ultra Prism Valley had ever seen.

Meanwhile

Joseph was bored with cloud gazing at this point, so he decided to ask if Rory could check their surroundings again, she obliged reluctantly before doing her little ritual to use her aura sense, while that was going on Sammy was stretching after his long nap, "Man I needed that."

Slippy rolled over to Sammy and smiled, "That's great! Maybe now that you're well-rested, we'll finally be able to spot this enigmatic Pokémon."

Rory's ears twitched as she sensed a strange presence, "Uh, guys?"

"What, did you sense something?" Joseph asked.

"I think so, but something's a little off about their aura."

Slippy rolled over to Rory with a concerned expression, "What's wrong with it?"

"I can't say for sure but-"

Rory ducked as a beam fired out from in the foliage, mere moments later an extremely weird Pokémon presented itself, once it was out in the open it let out an otherworldly roar, "⎎⍀⟒⌇⊑ ⋔⟒⏃⏁!"

The monster looked like some kind of floating squid jellyfish thing, it had no visible facial features, but its emotions were still clearly telegraphed through its actions, it dove at Rory and attempted to latch onto her head.

Rory rolled out of the way and shot a Flash Cannon toward the creature to keep it at bay, it dodged quickly but was quickly struck by a Water Gun from Slippy. While the creature was recovering, Rory whipped her head back toward Joseph and Sammy, "What is that thing!?"

"It's a Nihilego! Also known as UB-01 Symbiont! As the code name implies, it's a parasite that tries to latch on to you and take over your body, it's also super poisonous so if it manages to latch on you're probably going to need a trip to the infirmary to treat the poison."

Rory sighed, "Good grief, thank goodness I'm a steel type then."

The Nihilego lunged at Rory once again, only to be met by Sammy's Razor Shell, as the interloper stumbled back Sammy shouted, "RORY NOW!"

Sammy tossed one of his shells to Rory, who proceeded to kick it as hard as she could, turning it into a projectile. The shell clocked the Nihilego in the nonexistent face, knocking it onto the ground, once it was on the ground Joseph charged up a Spark and slammed it with all his might. Once Team Echoes' onslaught let up, the Nihilego lay on the ground motionless.

Rory dusted her paws off, "Well, that settles that I guess. Let's get Mew over here so we can get out of here!"

Joseph hummed as he nodded, "On it!"

Joseph could still feel a faint psychic presence from when Mesprit was talking to him earlier, so he focused on trying to get her attention, 'Hey Mesprit? Can you hear me?'

Joseph sat in silence for a moment before hearing a response, ' Did you find something?'

'We were jumped by an Ultra Beast. If I had to guess, this is probably the Pokémon Mew was looking for.'

'Alright, hang tight, we'll be there soon.'

Joseph moved his focus back to the real world, once he was back on earth he noticed that the Nihilego was creeping up behind Rory again, "RORY LOOK OUT!"

"Huh?"

The Nihilego latched onto Rory and began to take over her mind, all the while Team Echoes could do precious little about it, "RORY!" Sammy shouted as he drew his shells once again.

A grim smirk appeared as shadows obscured Rory's face, "Ohohohohohoh, don't worry about me, I'm doing great, some would say better than ever, you're the problem here! "

"W-what!?"

Rory's fist came crashing straight into Sammy's face, sending him flying into a nearby tree. As soon as that happened, Joseph got back in touch with Mesprit, 'ANY TIME NOW!'

'What's going on? Are you being attacked?'

But before Joseph could answer, he saw Rory's infected form towering over him, before he knew it he was careening toward the same tree Sammy was lying under.

'Joseph!? Speak to me, Joseph!'

Slippy was cowering, one moment he was chilling with his friends, the next one of them got taken over by an alien, "W-w-what do I do!?"

Slippy started to back himself into a corner when he heard a voice echo in his head, ' Slippy, don't give up, it may seem grim, but I'm sure you can pull through.'

Slippy recognized the voice almost instantly, he teared up as he continued to back into the corner, "M-m-mama…"

He shook the tears from his eyes and donned a determined expression as an orange aura overtook him, "N-no! You're right mama! I've gotta take this creep out and save my friends!"

Crystals formed around Slippy as he began to Terastallize into a fighting type, he emerged wearing a crown topped with a gem fist performing an uppercut.

The beast controlling Rory cackled, "Neat trick for a little newbie, what are you gonna do? Crush me with that gaudy crown of yours?"

'This feeling…' Slippy thought, 'It feels like every fiber of my being is telling me to destroy that creep!'

"Are you just gonna sit there, or am I gonna have to start using you as a beach ball before you acknowledge me!?"

Slippy responded by letting out a war cry, "HURAAAAAAAH!"

A stream of ice shot out of Slippy's mouth, immobilizing Rory's body, then another stream hit the creature in control, "Ugh! C-can't move!"

"Good… That makes this next part a lot easier."

The Nihilego struggled to break free from the ice's grasp, its struggles were in vain however as it was unable to budge, so the creature conjured glowing stones that fired beams at Slippy.

Slippy tanked the beams with ease, "You fool! If you think your puny little Power Gems can phase me now, you're an idiot!"

'Crap! I can't shoot my Sludge Bomb at him! It's too c-c-cold! Wh-what do I do!?"

"You're probably wondering, 'What do I do?' eh?" Slippy taunted, "Well, I'll tell you what you can do, you can sit still while I BEAT YOU TO A PULP!"

The parasite struggled once more as a last-ditch effort, but it was pointless, before long a flurry of punches and kicks peppered every inch of the parasite's body along with its host's, all the while Slippy yelled, "RAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!"

The final blow knocked the parasite free from its host and into a nearby tree, it was around this time that Mew and Mesprit showed up, although at this point all they could really do was watch things play out.

Slippy pursued the Nihilego and prepared his Terastal energy for another barrage, "You should've never messed with my friends."

"⌇⏁-⌇⏁⍜⌿! ⟟ ⌇⎍⍀⍀⟒⋏⎅⟒⍀! ⟟ ⊬⟟⟒⌰⎅!" The alien uttered in its native tongue.

"Can it, there's nothing you can say that'll get you out of this, in my language OR YOURS!"

Another barrage struck the Nihilego, every hit was like a bullet, crippling the poor creature more and more until the last blow practically put it into a coma, once the deed was done Slippy turned around and muttered, "You should've stayed in the mothership you bottom feeding freak!" His crown then faded in a cloud of crystal dust.

Mew and Mesprit stared in awe, "What… What the hell just happened?"

Mew shrugged, "Beats me, but what I do know is that Spheal's a menace!"

Slippy walked over to his teammates by the tree and shook them a bit, "Hey, are you two ok?"

Sammy opened his eyes and groaned, "Ugh… My back…"

Joseph rolled off of Sammy's lap and similarly groaned in pain, although he was more concerned about something else, "Dang… What items did we lose? Do we even lose items outside of dungeons?"

"You didn't lose anything, I took care of things." Slippy assured.

"You did what now?"

"I'll explain it once we check on Rory-"

Suddenly, Rory rushed over to Sammy and started bawling her eyes out, "I'MSOSORRYIDIDN'TMEANTOHURTYOUOHMYGOODNESSI'MSORRY!"

Sammy rolled his eyes, he then proceeded to reach into Rory's bag and shove one of her lollipops in her mouth, she immediately stopped crying, "Yup, she's fine." Sammy said somewhat sarcastically.

Joseph got up and dusted himself off, "Well all's well that ends well I guess…"

Mew inspected the now-unconscious life form, "This doesn't look like the Pokémon I'm looking for, but I don't exactly want to get beaten to a bloody pulp by a Spheal and his weird crystal energy fists, so I'll throw in some extra credit." Mew giggled as they tilted their head and smiled, "Besides, since we know this one's hostile I'm 100% free to experiment on it as much as I want, and I won't be violating any sort of law or anything."

Mesprit rolled her eyes, "As if any laws ever stopped you from doing any of the things you've done."

Mew giggled again, "Guilty as charged."

"Well, I'll check in with the other groups while Slippy explains what just happened."

Rory pulled her lollipop out of her mouth and sighed, "I can help… Unfortunately, I can remember what was going on while that thing controlled me."

Mesprit used her telepathy to reach out to Specter first, he reported that they hadn't found anything but that Yumi and Flint were having a good time just hanging out in nature. With that information, Mesprit was a little doubtful of the others, this however couldn't be more wrong.

Meanwhile

Xenon was still going on and on about tech, while Vulcan sat there and listened, although his interest was dwindling. He finally decided to step in and end Xenon's tech talk, "A-alright I'm starting to get a little overwhelmed, you've made it quite clear that you're not our enemy, so I'll let you off easy… For now anyway…"

Xenon was a little disappointed that he couldn't fully win over Vulcan, but he took the little victory he got. He stuffed his tablet away and moseyed on over to Cinder, "So um, what now?"

"I was thinking the exact same thing." Cinder said before feeling the psychic energy equivalent of a discord ping, "Oh! Mesprit's trying to reach me!"

'Hello?' Cinder thought to herself as Xenon stared at her like she was crazy.

'Have you found anything?'

'I think so, actually! Do you want me to bring them to you or what?'

'I'd prefer if you brought them here, but I'll just teleport you here if you can't.'

'I think we can bring them to you, I mean they don't seem like they'd be opposed to walking with us.'

'Good, now just bring them here, and we'll be all set to put this nightmare behind us.'

'Nightmare? Did something happen?'

'I'll explain when you get here, just try to get here quickly or things will probably explain themselves, and not in a good way.'

'Uh, ok? I'm not exactly sure what you mean by that, but I guess I'll figure it out when I get there.'

Mesprit cut the psychic link, allowing Cinder to explain the situation to her friends, "Hey everyone? Mesprit wants us to meet up with her right now."

Xenon brought a hand to his chin, "Mesprit? Who's that?"

"She's a friend of ours, she contacted me with her psychic power to tell us to come to her."

The Poipole pulled out his notepad once again and started scribbling, "Fascinating, could you tell me more about this psychic power?"

"Sure, but let's walk and talk, ok? Mesprit said that she needed us ASAP."

"Alrighty! Let's go!"

Cinder was about to walk off when she remembered Stumpy was still asleep, she woke him up and gave him a few pats before walking off to meet with Mesprit. On the way, Cinder explained psychic power to Xenon.

As they walked, Vulcan moved some vines out of the way with his Extrasensory. This gave Midnight an idea, "Hey Vulcan?"

"Yes?"

"Do you know how to use telepathy?"

"You mean that thing that lets you talk to others through their minds?"

Midnight switched to using her own telepathy for the next part, ' Yeah, that.'

"Nope, I don't even think I can use it, I mean I'm not a psychic type and Extrasensory is one of the few psychic moves that I can learn."

' Well, if I remember correctly, you can also learn Zen Headbutt and technically Tera Blast would count if you wore a psychic Tera Scarf.'

That gave Midnight an idea, ' Wait a second! What if I got you a psychic Tera Scarf!?'

Vulcan rolled his eye, "What difference would that make?"

The Lampent pointed at Stumpy's fire type scarf, ' It worked for teaching him Flamethrower, didn't it?'

"That's different! He had Cinder as a teacher, y'know, someone who knew the move? And on top of that, he had already shown signs of being able to breathe fire!"

' Exactly! And you're no different! I know how to use telepathy, and you've already shown signs of capability, therefor we should just buy a psychic type scarf and give it a shot!'

Vulcan sighed and shook his head, "Fine, I yield, we can try it… If you can find a psychic type Tera Scarf in any other color than pink, that is."

' Crud! That's gonna be Impossible!'

Vulcan almost tripped as he chuckled, "Good luck with that! You're gonna need it!"

After following the trace of Mesprit's psychic power for a little bit, Cinder and the gang arrived at their destination. Cinder did a quick head count and realized that everyone made their way here, she also noticed a certain alien creature being restrained by an oppressive pink aura, it struggled in an attempt to break free but ultimately got tired and gave up, "HOLY ARCEUS WHAT IS THAT THING!?" Cinder blurted.

"Oh! That's a Nihilego! They're pretty common where I'm from!" Xenon said, "I do wonder, though, how did it get here?"

Specter was ready to pounce Xenon in an instant, "I could ask you the same thing, you little purple weirdo!"

Mesprit held a hand toward Specter, "Hold it! This one doesn't seem as aggressive as the other one, let the human identify it before you attack!"

Joseph sighed, at this point, he was starting to wonder if Mesprit even remembered his name, "I have a name y'know."

Mesprit looked at Joseph and smiled, "Oh, I know that."

Joseph shook his head, "Girl, you're gonna get me killed."

"Are you gonna identify it or not!?"

"It's a Poipole, they are one of the rarer Ultra Beasts but also one of the less aggressive, er, well at least I think they are anyway, I don't remember ever seeing one in the wild in anything I've seen."

"That's correct!" Xenon added, "We Poipole are known for being friendly!"

Upon hearing that Mew's plans had completely changed, "Friendly, you say? Well, would you mind helping me out for a while? I've got some questions I want to ask you."

Xenon thought it over for a moment, "Well… I do need more research for my own paper… I'll tell you what, I'll give you any information you want about my world, and in return, you do the same for this world, do we have a deal?"

Sparkles appeared in Mew's eyes, "DEAL! You can be like my little apprentice for a while!"

"Alright, well as long as I have a roof over my head I'm fine with that."

Mew quickly floated over to Joseph and Rory, who were standing right next to each other, "Here, I guess I should reward you, I mean you did do my job after all!"

Mew handed Joseph a black scarf with a gold swirl on it, "Is this a Tera Scarf?" He asked.

"I don't know, all I was told is that it could help open your third eye, but since I'm already a psychic I don't really need it."

Midnight eyed Vulcan with a look that screamed 'You know what that means.', "Well would you look at that, it's a psychic Tera Scarf in a color that isn't pink! You gotta let me teach you telepathy now!"

Vulcan sighed as defeat washed over his face, "Alright, fine… Just don't yell at me when it doesn't work, ok?"

"Alright."

Joseph stuffed the scarf in his bag as Mew handed Rory her reward, "It's… A rock?"

Mew nodded, "Yup! A very special rock I might add, it comes from a far-off place called Mount Coronet, nobody's ever been there but-"

Yumi cut Mew off, "I've been there! It's from my home in the Hisui region! It's this big mountain with a weird temple looking thing at the top! There's also a weird magnetic field there!"

Mew shrugged, "Huh, well I guess I gotta add that to my notes too, thanks miss."

Rory thought that Mew was toying with her, "So what? It's just a rock!"

Yumi took a closer look at the rock, "That's a piece of Tumblestone! Maybe I could try to make a Pokéball with it."

Seeing as Rory didn't really have a use for the stone, she dropped it into Yumi's paws and walked off, "It's yours, I have no use for it anyway, so go nuts."

Yumi stuffed the Tumblestone into her satchel with a smile, "Thanks, Mew!"

Mew returned the smile and waved, "You're welcome, and have a safe trip back home!"

"Bye!"

Mew and Xenon floated away, presumably to get started sharing notes and other nerdy activities, that just left Team Echoes and Mesprit sitting in the middle of the dense jungle, "So, I take it your little posse is on its way back home now?" Mesprit asked.

Joseph took a break from giving Stumpy head pats and nodded, "I guess so."

"Well… Today was nice… It was nice to hang out with you in a more chill environment."

Joseph was surprised, he was under the impression that Mesprit was merely tolerating him until he stopped Fiora the big evil meanie, "Wow, I uh, kinda didn't think you really cared about us."

"Well, you're a little more tolerable than Zapdos, that's for sure."

Joseph looked rather unamused, "Thanks…"

Mesprit jabbed Joseph with her elbow, "I'm kidding! I said we were friends, didn't I?"

"Well, it's kinda hard to tell if you really meant that when you won't so much as call me by my name!"

"Sorry… It's something that kinda stuck with me, I used to- uh, n-never mind!"

"Huh?"

"It's nothing! It's nothing."

Mesprit was being really fishy, but Joseph decided not to pry, he figured that was a story for another time, "Alright then, I'll back off."

Mesprit exhaled heavily, "Thanks… I'm not sure that I wanted to let that train of thought slip yet…"

"Well, what can I say, it's what friends do."

Joseph looked at Mesprit and flashed a friendly smile, this smile, in turn, made Mesprit smile, which in this universe is a somewhat rare sight considering she's kinda been in the middle of a few apocalyptic scenarios. Once the two were done being corny and genuine, Joseph began to walk toward his teammates so they could discuss how they'd be getting home, it was then that Mesprit stopped him, "W-wait, before you go, can I ask you something?"

Joseph turned back to make proper eye contact with Mesprit, "Go ahead."

Mesprit swapped from using her actual voice to her telepathy, she wanted to ask in private so she took advantage of her psychic power to do just that, ' May I stay the night at your place tonight, y'know if it's not too much to ask.'

"O-oh, uh… Sure?"

Mesprit vanished momentarily before reappearing with a pillow in hand and a nightcap on her head, "Thanks!"

February 7th, 8:57 pm

Team Echoes Base - Joseph's room

Coast Continent

The team made their way home for the day, they had completed their mission and stopped a potentially major threat, while also making some pretty weird friends along the way. After a long day of work, they headed home. Joseph hadn't told anyone that Mesprit was staying the night at the base yet, so you can imagine the shock on Yumi's face as Mesprit appeared in Joseph's room late at night, "U–u-um, J-Joseph? Why's Mesprit here?"

Mesprit set her things on a spare bed in the corner of the room, "He hasn't told you yet?"

"Told me what?"

Joseph entered the room and began to clarify things, "Oh, hey Mesprit, I uh, didn't tell anyone else you were coming, I mean I thought it was only fair since you asked me in private."

"Oh, thank you!" Mesprit said as she shot Joseph a pleasant smile.

Yumi was still completely lost, "So… Why is she here?"

"Oh, I wanted to have a sleepover! It's been a really long time since I've had one!"

The look on Yumi's face was priceless. If I had to describe it I'd say it was halfway between disgust and surprise, although she only really felt the latter emotion, if that makes sense, "H-hold on, so you mean to tell me a legendary Pokémon wants to crash here for the night?"

"Don't sweat the details too much, 'hon, I won't make a mess or anything, and I'll be gone by morning. That sound good to you?"

"I… I guess… Just… Don't try to kill me in my sleep, ok?"

Mesprit burst out laughing, "C'mon, have a bit more trust in me! I wouldn't do that unless you actually deserved it! Besides, if I wanted you dead…"

Mesprit paused as she used her psychic power to dim the lights around the room, "... I would have killed you by now."

Joseph rolled his eyes, "I'd be threatened if your head wasn't the same shade of pink as cotton candy. Besides, I feel like I've heard that in a video game before."

Mesprit sighed, "Well, at least Yumi's intimidated."

A guilty look washed over Yumi's face, " Yeah, about that…"

Mesprit facepalmed, "Oh come on!"

"I'm sorry! Blame Joseph! I was scared until he opened his mouth!"

Mesprit removed her hands from her face, "Whatever, I'm too tired to think of a better threat, I'll see you in the morning."

Mesprit floated over to her bed and plopped down while Joseph and Yumi got comfy in their beds, as they drifted off they both hoped for normal, sweet dreams, although unfortunately, that wouldn't be the case for one of them…

But that's a tale for another time, for now, there's still someone else we should check up on before we sign off…

February 7th, 9:00 pm (Based on Coast Continent time)

Mew's Lab

Jungle Continent

Mew floated quietly through the halls of their massive underground lab. Xenon had already gone to sleep for the night, so Mew was doing their best to not wake him.

'I should check up on the test tubes…' Mew thought.

Mew entered the test tube sector of the lab and inspected each tube, "Let's see… That one's still empty… Same with that one… I say that as if something's gonna jump into the tube on its own."

Mew moved away from the empty tubes and inspected the ones containing living organisms, "Mewtwo seems to be developing quite nicely, maybe I'll have an actual roommate soon…"

Mew floated to the tube to the left of Mewtwo's, inside there seemed to be a strange four-legged creature, its forelegs looked like they belonged to a bird or bug while its hind legs looked like mammalian legs but with a mix of both scales and fur, to top it all off it had some weird metal bits on its face, a fish tail, and this weird axe like thing on its head, "That one's coming along nicely as well, although it seems less active than Mewtwo, could our visitors have something to do with that?"

Finally, Mew floated over to the tube on the far left, this one was unique as the creature inside wasn't created by Mew, rather it was stuffed in there by Mew, "Last we have Nihilego… It seems restless, I can only imagine it hates its new enclosure… Oh well, it should've thought of that before becoming a face-hugger."

Nihilego continued to thrash about in its enclosure, desperately hoping for a way out, "Shut up! Or I'll splice your DNA with that of a Trubbish!"

Despite not understanding Mew's shouting, the Nihilego stopped thrashing out of fear that its life would become a living hell if it didn't. With peace and quiet restored, Mew had an idea, "Hey, wait a sec, I wonder if the whole 'you have the DNA of every Pokémon in existence' thing that Arceus told me applies to Pokémon from other worlds too."

Mew focused on Nihilego, they noted every little minute detail about its anatomy, from the weird tentacles to the lack of eyes, every detail was noted and taken into account. Once Mew was done studying the alien lifeform they closed their eyes, took a deep breath, and transformed. Mew opened their eyes to find that they had no eyes, "Huh, I guess it worked, I'm an alien now, that's pretty sick. Maybe I should record this in my notes."

Mew floated out of the room as they continued to mumble about their strange new form, meanwhile, a slight tapping sound could be heard from coming from one of the tubes,

'I want to help… I want to protect the world…'

And with that chapter 17 comes to a close, yet again I kinda just disappeared for a month without notice… I really wish there were a better way to keep you all up to date, but I guess it's not that big of a deal.

That being said I'm probably gonna stop going "Hey guys I'm not dead I've just been taking a bit" going forward because I realized that these things take time, I mean as I'm writing this the word count is sitting around 22k, so I think that kinda explains why I was gone so long, I just love rambling on I guess.

All that aside, I've been meaning to shed a little light on Slippy's past for a while now, but I never really got around to it because he's kinda been pushed to the side in favor of giving other characters the spotlight, I'm gonna try my best to shift the spotlight around so that our giant cast of main characters, all get the spotlight they deserve (Although I'm probably gonna keep delaying giving Vulcan a special episode lol).

Anyway, to close things out have a boss bio!

/ /Boss data downloaded successfully!\ \

UB-01 Symbiont and its host, Rory!

Rory was abruptly assimilated by Nihilego, who forced her to attack her friends. Joseph was in no shape for a fight and Sammy couldn't hurt Rory even if he wanted to, leaving Slippy to fight her on his own. Thankfully, it seems that someone was watching over Slippy, granting him the strength to defeat the alien interloper and save his friends. Something doesn't add up though… When did Slippy learn Ice Beam?

Anyway, I think that's all for this time. There were no reviews as far as I'm aware, so uh yeah, next time, we peer into αnother strαnge dreαm, see you then.