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Aile would land and take the box from Tatooine, giving her a quick look before walking up to the door. This person really took strides to make sure they didn’t have to go into town often, even to the point of ordering a delivery from Peachy. How long would this have taken him to get here? Did he have a Pokémon that could fly, or would he have had to hoof it? Arceus, she’d hate to see how long that would have taken. Probably at least as long as it took her and Aden to get to the Crystal Pool…Speaking of that, Aile looked back up to the peak of the mountain, wondering what happened to Aden. He hadn’t shown up at all, no pings from his SNAG, nothing. For all the insight she got from the festival, she wished she hadn’t missed Aden leaving. It just didn’t feel right to her.

Shaking her head, she’d focus again on why she was here. She was here to deliver a package, not reminisce on what happened at the Crystal Pool. That could come when she returned to HQ. Taking a deep breath, she would knock on the door and call out, “Hello! I have a delivery here from Peachy’s!”

Aile blinked and stood up a bit straighter when she was yelled at, looking briefly at Tatooine, who had as much of a confused face as her own, before turning back and waiting for a moment. When the door finally cracked open, the woman would give a small wave with her right hand before bringing it back to help support the box. "Right, so, Peachy's back in Mossui, potentially handling some other deliveries, and you can call me Aile. I've offered my time to help Peachy today. I've been coming around the full moon for the past... four months, yeah, to check out the Timeless Woods. I heard about a story about a creature that haunts it around that time, and wanted to see if the rumors were true." Not a lie, but certainly not the whole story. Again, who would believe her that she's here because of a fortune teller's premonition? "During the spare time I have during the day, I've been offering to help some of the residents out, and I'm helping Peachy today catch up on his deliveries currently, since he's been backed up since the festival. Would you like me to just leave this out here, then?" Aile would give a look and a nod away to Tatooine, fully expecting from his current attitude to just shoo them away again. Maybe she might be wrong, we'll see.

Aile's eyebrows raised slightly when the hermit mentioned, shouted at her, really, about the others that have disappeared in the Timeless Woods. She hadn't been told, but she could probably guess why. They probably appreciated someone visiting from outside Kitakami, and didn't want to scare her off. Maybe a more selfish reason, yes, but with the noticeable lack of youths in the town, she still couldn't blame them. And a monster in the forest? Well... "I've gone up against things that one might call monsters that turned out to be just very odd Pokemon. I've also gone up against true monsters, ones that look exactly like humans. The latter scare me more than the former, which is my suspicion of what's in the woods. So, I'll still be going tonight." She put down the box in front of the door with a small sigh, starting to turn around. "...I also need to see if something I was told about at the festival was true. Because if one is, there’s a chance another one might be, which I dread quite more than this. But I need to see for myself. Anyways, I’ll let Peachy know that you want him alone to deliver your packages from here on out. Have a good rest of your day, sir." Walking up to Tatooine, Aile would give her a pat as she thought on the hermit’s words. People going missing in the woods, and then the fortune teller’s premonition a few months back… ’Join forces and aid one another for a better tomorrow or destroy each other and put an end to the suffering of hope.’ If this was true, it was going to be an interesting night for them when it finally happened.

Aile snapped out of her thoughts when she was poked by Tatooine, with the woman realizing she was staring in the direction of the Timeless Woods. “Right, yeah. Sorry, just thinking. Yes, we’re still going this evening, his words haven’t changed my mind. We’re just going to have to be more cautious. Let’s go, Tati.” Hopping on her loyal dragon’s back, she patted her side as the Flygon took off into the air, heading back to Mossui Town.

Aile would smile as the pair flew next to the flock of Swanna and Ducklett, letting the sight of the relaxed birds calm her mind a little. The thought of people going missing, though, still stayed rattling around in her head. Where had they gone, how did they go missing? How many people went missing? Hm.... Maybe the SNAG could get turned on when they left tonight. Maybe it could still be tracked when it was turned off, but just to be confident, maybe it should get turned on for a while.

When they landed, she'd give Tati a pat on the head, waving to the old man. "Hey! Yeah, everything was pretty simple to find, and having Tati definitely helped. The old hermit wasn't happy to see me, though. Yelled at me to leave, told me to tell you that they wanted you to deliver the package next time, and..." She bit her lower lip momentarily before letting out a small sigh. "They also mentioned that people went missing in the Timeless Woods. Is that true? ...And if it is, how so?" She felt a little awkward asking that, but she did need to know what she might have been getting into. Was it just complete vanishing, or were there, say, traces of clothes found somewhere in the forest? Something to plan for.

Aile tilted her head, thinking. Strange Pokémon, bright flashes of light, and a misty area in the forest. People had even gone missing in those areas, too. Some of this felt very familiar to what happened to the Crystal Pool, down to someone disappearing. Though, it could be coincidence with that last part, she hadn’t heard of any disappearances related to the Pool. Though, there could be some sort of superstition around that, too. Maybe they didn’t want to admit they had some weird stuff going on, and nothing was mentioned, they could just ignore it and keep going about a regular life. On one hand, she would have liked to know about this. However, normalcy was nice. Normalcy was appreciated. She couldn’t blame the locals for wanting that.

The woman would lean back against Tatooine, who was mildly caught off guard by the act, looking down as Aile closed her eyes and bit her thumbnail. She was now thinking about her next actions, what she was going to do before the evening came. She was still going to go out tonight, that much was for certain. She was also probably going to turn her SNAG on as well. What she needed to figure out was if she was going to pack supplies in case something happened, or if she was going to send a message to Sub for a just in case of a sudden event where she disappears. “Thank you for being honest with me, Peachy,” she finally said, opening her eyes. “I’ll do my best to be careful. However, considering my current employer, something’s bound to happen eventually. I’ll do my damnedest to come back, though. I survived getting thrown out into a desert and losing most of my Pokémon, and managed to come back to civilization. I’ll make it back here somehow.” She gave a small smirk with that before standing up straight. That much was true. Even if she lost her Pokémon once more, somehow, she’d find them all again and find her way back. This time without the wishy-washy delay of not knowing where to go after finding everyone. “Thanks again for the information, Peachy. We’re gonna figure out our plan for tonight.” Aile would wave to Peachy, giving a nod to the Flygon before walking. “Let’s go, Tati. We’ve got some prep to do.” Tatooine would watch Aile for a moment before following her, waving back to the old man as well.

Aile would return to the visitor’s center, making herself a quick lunch before returning to her room, eating a cup ramen and bringing out a notebook and pencil. Just something quick while she planned. Before she grabbed the pencil, though, she would make sure all of her Pokémon(that could fit in the room) had something to eat as well. Once they were all situated eating, she would find herself a cozy spot in the room and begin planning. Most of it would be listing possible plans, how to go about things, and what to do beforehand. Eventually, she did decide on sending a message to Sub first. Dragging out her SNAG from her back, she would turn it on and start typing out a message to the team leader. The first time she wrote it, she didn’t like how it turned out seemingly rambly and long, so it would get deleted. The second time didn’t feel much better, either. Sighing, she would pause and lean back, thinking it through for a second. Finally, she would begin typing up what would be the final version of her message.



She would finally send the message after the rewrites, taking a deep breath and slowly letting it out. She couldn’t help it, she was now a bit nervous. It wasn’t just herself she was putting at risk, it was all of her Pokemon as well. And then she was putting a burden of retrieval on others as well… but she brought enough stuff that in case she needed to be nimble, having her backpack with everything in it would be detrimental to that. She’d pack some medicine and some protein bars in a small bag, one that could easily be slung over her shoulder. Aile was still going to act like nothing was going to happen, but part of her wondered if this was too little… Well, if she went too far back, she was probably going to be screwed no matter how much she brought. And then if she was just obliterated from existence, then yeah, there was also no amount of supplies she could bring to fix that either. She figured out how to find a few things on her own back in Orre, before she came across Robert… She could probably figure it out again. Just in case, though, she’d wind up looking up a couple of foraging and survival tips, something that helped put her somewhat at ease.

Before she knew it, the sun was getting low in the sky, marking when Aile should be leaving. Deciding at the last minute to stuff another protein bar and some food for her Pokemon into that small bag, she’d finally sling it over her shoulder and walk up to the door, finally recalling everyone that was out right beforehand. She would stop in front of it, then rub her face with her hands, trying to knock herself out of her worried mood. While that didn't quite work, she would put on a mask of cheeriess and some confidence, enough to hopefully fake it for most of the town. With a small smile on her face, she’d walk out and head out of town, waiting until she was a good ways away from the gate before letting the smile drop and bringing out Tatooine. “Hey, Tati.”

“Gon?” Tatooine would look at her trainer, noting the look she had. Dare she think it, Aile looked even more serious than earlier.

“Just worried, not going to lie.” The trainer sighed, turning her full attention to the dragon as they walked. “What if it’s something like what happened to Aden? He just kind of…”

“Fly fwy gon gyon?”

“So, the Crystal Pool was… weird. I didn’t see anything, and Aden kind of went… catatonic, I guess? And then, there was a small green flash for me, and mists just started rolling in until everything was white. That’s when I met with the previous holder of this artifact.” Aile motioned with her left arm, continuing. “Things suddenly broke up after a while, and then when the white room cleared, Aden was gone. I just… What if we just vanish, too?”

“Gon gon, fly.” Tatooine would hop up behind her and give her trainer as big of a hug as her tiny arms could muster. “Fly gon gon fly. Flyfly, gyon gon fly fwy.”

Aile took a deep breath in before letting it out slowly. Tatooine was right. She’d have her Pokémon. They managed to get through things before. This time wasn’t going to be any different. “Yeah, you’re right, Tati. Thanks.” A small smile would cross Aile’s face as she looked up at her closest friend, before looking up at the sky. They were still going to go, but how did the sky took tonight?

There would be an eye roll and a small chuckle from Aile when she got the reply back. At the very least, she was going to take it as a sign that this wasn't going to be as big Aile was worried it could be.

-----

Aile and Tatooine would look up at the night sky as the sun fully set, watching the stars come out. It was a beautiful night, as it always was in Kitakami, and with such little light pollution, you could see so many more stars than what one may normally see near a town. However, the stars weren't what caught their breath. It was the one celestial body that was colored crimson now. "There it is, Tati."

"Flygon?"

Taking a sharp breath, Aile nodded. "When you are." With a confirmation nod from Tatooine, the woman would climb on her dragon's back, and the pair would take off to the edge of the Timeless Woods.

Once they had arrived to the edge, the pair made their way down the very small natural ramp into the forest proper. "Here we go. Tati, you rest inside your ball for now, in case things go bottoms up. I'm going to have Dagobah take the reins at this point." Tatooine nodded, and Aile would recall the Flygon to her Pokéball, replacing it with an Ultra Ball and sending the Pokémon in there out. The large bog bear would shake herself, looking around at her surroundings, then her trainer. "Dega, sniff around, se if there's any unusual scents. I know I've had you do this before, but tonight's different. Tonight's the night that was foretold." The Ursaluna gave her a questioning look, then lowered herself down slightly so Aile could get on her back better, as if this had been practiced so many times before. It was a routine at this point. Every full moon they would show up, and Dega would try to sniff something out. And every time, nothing happened. So, it made sense that Dagobah would start wondering why she kelp doing this. But this time was the Blood Moon. There had to be something different now. There just had to be.

Aile watched Dega sniff around, noting that the further they went in the forest, the thicker the fog got, dyed an ominous red thanks to the light coming through the trees. Aile rubbed her arms, the lack of sounds from anything other than themselves unnerving her. Where did the Pokémon disappear to? Even the Ghost Pokémon that haunted this place were gone... and the mushrooms? What happened? Not like she enjoyed the idea of mushrooms being around, but at least these weren't placed precisely in a circle.

Then came their one clue. The Big Mushroom that had a conspicuously large bite taken out. There weren't a lot of things that could take a bite that big here. The bear would take a good sniff around, but lost the trail almost as soon as she picked it up. Dagobah would snarl, getting frustrated that this one new scent she found couldn’t be tracked. “Dega, Dega. It’s okay, the mist is probably making things harder.” She would pat the Ursaluna on the back before sliding down her back. “It’s okay. If we can’t track by scent, we can try by vibrations.” With that, she’d bring her left hand down to the ground, attempting to sense anything that might be moving, either away or towards them. There had to be something in the forest besides them still.