Iron Forest

1F

What seemed like fog came out of Ethan's mouth as he stepped into the Iron Forest, frostbitten dirt and dead leaves under his feet. "What's this weird smoke?" he asked before exhaling deeply.

"That's your breath," Fennekin laughed from behind him before letting out some fog of her own. "When it gets really cold, you can see it. Neat, huh?"

He breathed out again, then was caught off guard by the small trails of foggy breath that came from his nostrils as he stood there and breathed normally. "It's certainly...something. Definitely weird, I didn't even know breath looked like anything. I always thought it was...well. Breath."

Fennekin's ears crackled as if she was going to use Ember, but instead simply exhaled in a steady stream of fog. "Before I learned how to use fire-type moves, I'd always pretend my breath was the smoke or steam from them."

While Fennekin was enjoying the phenomenon of visible breath, Ethan scanned the room they were in; long, not very wide, with two exits on the opposite wall from where they were. There were no no Pokémon or items that he could see in the room they were in, so he started going to the one to their left. "Are you from somewhere cold, then?" he asked.

"Yeah, it gets really cold there." Her voice sounded almost excited; she was handling the cold outside the Forest better than anybody else they were with, but she also had seemed to enjoy the summer heat. "I always loved when it started getting cold, because that meant snow wasn't that far off!"

The passageway leading out of the room they were in was straight, and given it was nighttime and the canopy of trees above them was blocking out most of the moonlight, it was hard to tell exactly how long it went or where it emptied; only one way to find out, he supposed. "I've heard about snow," he said, continuing the conversation. "It's basically like ice that falls like rain, right?"

"Not quite," Fennekin mused. "It's...kinda like its own thing. Not fully ice, not fully water. Like, it sticks together and can pile up like ice, but it's usually less heavy and hard than it. Does that make sense?"

"Not really," he laughed, "but it's probably cold enough here for it to start snowing, right? I might get to experience it coming up here soon."

"Maybe. It's night though, which is always a lot colder. And even then it's just kinda cold, not cold cold."

"I'll take your word for it. Is this near where you're from, then?"

"Not really, I'm just from somewhere that's also pretty far north of Pokéopolis."

"Ever thought about going back?"

Silence fell over them as they passed through a small room, quickly picking up a Rawst Berry and continuing on straight. "Thought about, yes," she responded. "Seriously thought about...no. I don't think I'd be welcome back."

"Did something happen?"

"Not something...lots of little things, I guess. It just got to the point where I knew I couldn't stay home much longer, and if I was going to go to Pokéopolis to try and become an explorer, then I didn't think I had much of a window any longer. So, I went and chased my dream." A single light laugh escaped her. "But having to go rescue a friend from who knows what wasn't a part of the dream."

"Think of it like just another rescue mission: someone's in danger, and we have to go help them."

"Yeah, I guess. Lot more nerve-wracking when it's one of our friends, and especially because we know she's strong and couldn't be taken by just any Pokémon."

"They caught her by surprise. We at least know there's Pokémon here that could defeat us, so we can be more careful."

"But she's careful." Fennekin sighed before going towards the exit of the room, waiting next to it for Ethan. "She's one of the main scouts for the Academy, she's not someone that could just get surprised and overpowered easily, especially with Aipom beside her."

"Surprise can count for a lot." He walked to her and into the hallway, Fennekin falling in behind him. "And maybe they were already pretty roughed up before going into the fight. We at least know there might be someone waiting for us at the end of this…that has to count for something, right?"

Fennekin sighed, a white cloud of breath escaping her. "I guess. I'm just worried, is all."

The hallway came to a T, Ethan deciding to go right. "Well, there's not really a chance to go back now. Negative as that sounds."

"I'm not regretting, just…worrying. I still think this is the right thing to do, but sometimes you need to be scared, right? You can't overcome your fears if you never face them."

"Like leaving home to go become an explorer?"

Fennekin laughed lightly; he could tell that helped her mood, even if only slightly. "Yeah, I guess." The two walked in silence the rest of the hallway, soon coming to a narrow but long room with two offshoots to their right and one on the opposite wall, stairs located in the dead center.

As they began walking towards the stairs, a Pokémon walked out of one of the hallways to the right of them, a four-legged brown and white one with a yellow flower on its head. As Ethan readied for battle, Fennekin stepped beside and then in front of him.

"Fennekin?"

As the Pokémon grew close, she took a deep breath in, the signature crackling sound of a fire-type move preceding an Ember filling the air before she let out a shot of fire, hitting the Pokémon dead on and causing it to turn and run. "We should probably go before more come."

"That looked super effective," he mused. "What Pokémon was that? It's not like anything I've ever heard of."

"It's a Deerling. I figured I could probably defeat it pretty quickly, before it got to us."

"A Deerling?" He stood there a moment, thinking through what he knew of the Pokémon. He'd never seen one in person before, true, but they had fought a Sawsbuck, which he knew was its evolution. But the pictures he saw were a little different; weren't Deerling normally pink? Unless…

"Was that a shiny Pokémon?" he asked. "I remember hearing about those once or twice."

A confused look on her face, Fennekin shook her head. "No, just a normal Deerling. Why?"

"Well, I remember seeing pictures of Deerling in one of Luxio's books before, but they weren't brown like that one was. If it was still a Deerling and wasn't a shiny, then what was it?"

Fennekin's face seemed to almost light up as he finished his question. "It was a winter Deerling! Deerling and Sawsbuck change appearance, depending on the season. That brown means winter is coming." She put a paw to her chin, thinking. "I guess it would be pretty cold this far north, even though it's still technically fall. I guess it's a little early, but not crazy early."

"And you just know all of this?" He chuckled slightly. "And I thought it was impressive I even managed to remember what a Deerling looked like, even if I thought that one was a shiny."

Fennekin blushed, clearing her throat. "Well, I've been a Pokémon longer than you. I've never really met a Deerling before, but I guess you just get used to stuff like that? We're incredibly varied; type, moves, abilities, not even to just say species as a whole…what's a few variations?"

"How many different types of Pokémon are there? I feel like I've seen and met a lot, but every time we go somewhere, it seems like I've only scratched the surface."

"A lot." She walked up next to the stairs, putting a paw on the first step. "I honestly don't know. Some are really rare, some people argue whether different forms of the currently same Pokémon are different ones, some we're not even sure exist…" A light smile grew on her face. "That's part of why I like adventuring. Maybe I'll be able to meet every kind of Pokémon, or meet some legendary ones."

"We've already met Shaymin. She was a legendary one, right?"

"I guess so." As she looked at Ethan, her smile grew. "Now, come on. We've got to get moving."

Iron Forest

3F

The ground crunched underneath Ethan's feet as he stepped up into a wide, square room with exits on all sides. He looked down, expecting to see some fallen leaves or twigs, but only dirt was beneath his feet. But as he looked a little closer, hunching over slightly…

"Is that ice?" he asked.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Fennekin bend down, bringing her face closer to the ground. "No. Well, yes, but kinda. It's frost, from the looks of it." Smoke came out of her nose as she sighed happily. "It really is getting cold up here if it's frosting this early into the night."

"Do you think any ice types would live here?" Ethan asked, picking the exit in front of them to go down. "That would be nice if so; we could just have you use Ember through all of them, I bet."

"Maybe," she thought aloud as she fell in behind him. "A lot of ice types prefer places where it's consistently colder all year, but I guess some might live here. This part of the world isn't the best explored, but what I did find said a lot of grass, bug, and water types."

"That's still good! Ember and Thundershock should take care of most things, right?"

"Yeah," she nodded. "We'll need to make sure to be smart about it, though; we don't know how big this dungeon is. We'd hate to run out of power so early on."

"We packed something for that, right?" He opened their bag and started rummaging through it. "A, um…it started with an E."

"Elixir." She thought for a moment. "Or ether. Both work, but an elixir makes you feel recharged on all of your moves, while an ether only does some of them." After Ethan rummaged through the bag again for a few moments, she looked over inside of it. "Did we really forget to back any of either of those?"

"Yeah." He chuckled nervously, pulling a single small seed out of the bag. "But we have…uh, this. It does something! Maybe."

Fennekin giggled. "That's a plain seed…I suppose you could eat it if you were really, really hungry, but it doesn't really do anything otherwise."

With a shrug, he tossed it aside and looked in the bag again. "Some oran berries, a pecha berry, okay those aren't too bad." He stuck his arm in further. "An escape orb, that's useful. Quick seed, hail orb, a…royal gummi? And a few gravelrocks. I guess nothing's really useless in here…though I thought I packed better than I did." He chuckled nervously.

"We'll just take it slow and be careful!" she beamed. "And we have the escape orb, just in case. Hopefully we don't need it, but…you never know."

"Right." He closed the bag, taking a look about the room. None of the exits were well-lit enough to see where they went, so he chose the one to his right and started walking. "Do you know if there's a town up here that we could buy some ethers or elixirs at?"

"I don't really think so. Not that I know of, anyway. And the map we're using to navigate doesn't have any towns on it in this area, either."

"Why exactly is that?" The hallway lead to a small, empty room, exits on both the right and left. Right again it was. "It seems like Pokéopolis is the only city in the world. Nobody ever talks about anywhere else."

"It's not the *only* city, that is…just the biggest. Bayou Bay, far to the south of us, is also kind of big, but there's a lot of pirates and bandits around there." She paused. "Then there's Thieftown. It's…not safe at all. Full of bad Pokémon."

"Thieftown?" he echoed, following the hallway as it turned right. "That seems a little…I don't know, pessimistic? To call your city. Doesn't exactly sound like a place I'd want to live."

"Other people called it that, and they took it as a weird badge of pride." He could hear her scoff behind him. "I've met some Pokémon from there. They're not good people. They all only cared about themselves."

The hallway turned right again, then went on a little while longer before emptying into the same room they had entered the floor from, eliciting a sigh from Ethan. Straight forward it was. "What about other Pokémon? You said ice types like to live where it's consistently cold, is Thieftown super cold?"

"There are lots of other places that Pokémon live! But they're smaller towns and villages, really. A lot of Pokémon don't really like living in the big city…too crowded and noisy for a lot of them."

The hallway bent to the right — what was it with this floor and right turns? — and continued straight. "Do you like living in Pokéopolis, Fennekin? I know you wanted to join the Academy, but the way you're talking about it…I just want to make sure you're not miserable between missions."

"Oh, no! I love Pokéopolis." A happy sigh came from behind him. "There's so many Pokémon, so much to do, and there's just so much history in the city!"

The hallway turned right — of course — and emptied into the second room they had visited, causing Ethan to just shake his head and make his way back to the original room again. "I'm glad to hear that."

"What about you? Do you like Pokéopolis?"

Ethan stopped walking for a brief moment, thinking it over before resuming. "I'd never really thought about it, honestly. I don't mind it. But again, I don't really know what came before, so I don't have anything to compare it to. I guess I don't really know much about what it'd be like to live anywhere else. It's hard to tell if what I know is because of living in a city, Pokéopolis specifically, the Academy…" He shrugged. "But whatever it is, I don't mind it. It's nice getting to go on these missions with you and everyone else."

Before Fennekin could respond, they walked back into the main room, two new Pokémon there: a Dustox in front of them, and a Butterfree to their left. "I'll take the Dustox," he said, dropping into a fighting stance and readying the electricity in his body.

"No." The crackle of fire told him she was preparing Ember

"No?"

"I'll take the Dustox, you take Butterfree!"

"But I'll-"

"Ethan!"

"Right! Sorry!" He shifted his gaze towards the Butterfree, taking a few steps towards it and away from Fennekin in order to engage. As they got close to each other he let out a Thundershock, hitting it square before being covered in a light purple dust scattered from its wings. Was that an attack? He—

PoisonPowder. That's what that attack was, since he felt a sharp, stinging nausea course through his body, causing him to briefly drop to his knees. Gritting his teeth, he surged his electricity up again, letting out a second Thundershock, which the other Pokémon deftly evaded.

As it looked ready to prepare another attack, a small shot of fire streaked through the air, hitting it mid-attack; it made eye contact with Fennekin, then used Ethan doing the same thing as an opportunity to turn and run.

"Thanks," he grumbled, shakily getting to his feet and opening their bag. "I think I got poisoned from it."

"I did from the Dustox, too." She winced. "But we've only got the one pecha berry."

As he found the soft, slightly fuzzy berry in the bag, he took it out and extended his hand towards Fennekin. "You were the one who said she'd take the Dustox; you take it."

"But I made you take Butterfree. You take it."

Another sharp sting of poison. "Why, anyways? Why not you take Butterfree and I take Dustox?"

"Super effectiveness. We were better with you taking Butterfree."

"But they're both bug and flying types. Does Butterfree know some water moves or something?"

She shook her head. "Dustox isn't a flying type, it's a poison type. I had something for both of them, but you only had something for Butterfree."

"Oh." They both grit their teeth and moaned together, their poisons now apparently in sync. "Split it?"

"It wouldn't work. You might feel a little better, but the poison would still be there at full strength. You take it; there are some oran berries in there for me if it's a long trip to the stairs."

"No, you take it." He moved the pecha berry even closer, almost up to her mouth, which caused her to tilt her head away from it. "I can also eat oran berries."

She looked down at it, seeming almost sad at the thought. "Are you sure?"

"Yeah. It's just a pecha berry, Fennekin. One of us should eat it, we're both poisoned. If I have to pull rank and say I'm the one with the bag so I decide who takes it, I will."

Fennekin let out an uneasy giggle as she took the berry and bit into it. "You can just say leader, you know. Fewer words."

"We don't have a leader, though. We're both a part of the team."

"Well, yeah, but…you always do such a great job leading us through dungeons, and you're so level-headed. It makes sense for you to be our leader, even if that means doing like, fifty-one percent of the work and I do forty-nine." She giggled nervously. "Though it feels like I do a lot less than forty-nine…"

Another shot of poison, so he took out one of their oran berries and took a bite into its hard flesh. "Nah, you do plenty. And making a team was your idea and your dream after all, why wouldn't you be leader?"

"I don't know." She shrugged, a small but warm smile upon her face. "It feels natural, honestly. I think I do a good job following and supporting you; I don't really think I'm the kind of Pokémon that is a good leader. But…" Her smile grew. "Maybe that's okay! I don't think I need to be the one going around giving the orders, so long as we're still able to be helping people out. I think getting the job done and helping is more important to me than being the leader and the one in charge. Not to say that's not important to you, of course! Just…I don't know." She laughed. "We agreed to stop saying 'I don't know', didn't we?"

He laughed alongside her. "That we did. We should probably get moving then, huh? We've got a few oran berries, but I'd hate to waste them all here talking about who's the leader."

She nodded, taking a few steps towards the one exit in the room they had yet to explore. "Lead the way, leader!"

Smiling, he walked towards it, Fennekin falling in behind him as he entered the narrow passageway. And but of course, the hallway turned right, though soon emptied into a small room, featureless except for the stairs in the center.

It really had been that close to them this entire time?

Iron Forest Clearing

"This looks different," Ethan thought aloud as he stepped out into the small clearing of trees in the forest. They looked similar to everything else they had seen in the dungeon so far, though it was much more wide open; where before the trees were so tightly packed together he could hardly see through them, now they were much more evenly spaced out, and it seemed they could walk in any direction they wished.

"We might be out of the forest." Fennekin took a few steps around, looking at the area they were in. "Do you think we missed Emolga? I thought we would've found the strong Pokémon Aipom mentioned inside the dungeon, not outside of it. Seems like a weird place to get jumped."

"But he did say they didn't seem like mystery dungeon Pokémon." He adjusted the strap of their bag. "Come on, let's take a look around. Maybe it looks like there was a fight nearby; Emolga is an electric type too, so maybe there's some electric burn marks on something that can tell us where this happened."

"But he said that…" She sighed. "You're right, I'm just getting in my own head. I don't really have much else I can think of right now, so let's get looking."

As they took a few steps forward, Ethan felt his ears twitch. It sounded almost like…talking, off in the distance. "Do you hear that?" he asked.

Fennekin stood still, slowly moving her head. "I think so? It sounds like people talking. Do you think it could be the Pokémon who attacked her?"

"I doubt they'd stick around," he shrugged. "But maybe they saw something and can tell us more. But we should probably play it safe and take this slow and quiet anyways."

"Right." She lowered herself towards the ground, while Ethan hunched over. Slowly, the two walked their way through the trees, keeping a careful lookout on the ground to not disturb any particularly large branches or piles of leaves to make too much noise.

"Why would I keep lying?" a familiar voice cried out, further in the direction they were moving.

"Emolga," both whispered to each other as they made eye contact. Ethan nodded, then continued forward.

"You're protecting her," a smooth voice replied; a woman's, from the sounds of it. "We know you know her."

Now belly crawling along the ground, Team Stargazers hid in a small indent below a fallen log, looking out at the scene in front of them: Emolga was tied against a tree in a small clearing, not much larger than the one they exited from, three Pokémon all standing around her. One tall green one with what seemed to be a floating flower beside it, a green one with tendrils coming out from near its head like a mane, and a small, gray one with what looked like a zipper for a mouth: Meowscarada, Cradily, and Banette, if he wasn't mistaken.

"Who are those Pokémon?" he whispered.

"I have no idea." She looked at the Meowscarada. "Who's this 'her' they're talking about? Why do they think Emolga knows that person if she keeps saying no?"

Before Ethan could respond, he felt a fuzzy hand come over his mouth, tightly holding his head against something incredibly soft and fluffy.

"You two are going to have a lot of explaining to do," the familiar voice of Cinccino whispered.