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 Posted: Mon Jul 14, 2025 4:15 pm
Current Micromissions:
These mission are time sensitive with a deadline and may be completed by multiple members. These will also change as the guild story progresses (read: after each Team Mission) and affect things accordingly (if multiple members do the same mission we will attempt to make them all canon, no promises). Members who do these will also be rewarded for their efforts.
If you wish to do one of the current micromissions with multiple people you may do so as a Side RP but the deadline still applies. Notify me if you plan to do this and with whom.
Once the micromission is finished, be it by just yourself or as a pair/group, post it (or a link to it) in here and alert the administration about it. The micromission will then be marked as completed. Should all of the current micromissions be completed, we may refresh them or add new ones as needed.
Complete three micromissions in the current arc and receive a special reward.
-Threat Levels-
Threat Levels give you an idea on the kind of difficulty you should expect on these missions, such as the strength of the Pokemon you should face. Since micromissions typically provide you little information on exactly what to expect Threat Levels should give you a better idea on what you should be facing. Some rounds of micromissions may not be as high of a threat as others but the stakes will rise as the story arc progresses.
Green: Little to no threat, foes would be more annoying than anything.
Yellow: Mild threat, foes could be a hindrance but nothing too challenging.
Orange: Medium threat, foes can be challenging.
Red: High threat, foes will be extremely challenging.
Black: Extreme threat, expect the highest degree of resistance from your enemies.
Clean up our new HQ
Threat Level: Green
We are thankful for the new HQ however the place is absolutely filthy, why don't you help clean it up? (Try to have fun with this mission and make it silly. For ideas maybe consider what wild Pokemon could have made this place their home while it was unoccupied? Maybe stuff left behind from when it was Trainer Hill? Maybe even remains from when that Shadow Pokemon smuggling ring was here? Could even do something with some of the Trick Master's renovations. You have almost total creative liberty so have fun with it.)
How Does Our Garden Grow?
Threat Level: Green
The rooftop of Trainer Hill was resigned by the Trick Master to have a garden with plenty of planters and dirt to accomplish this. However the wilds have claimed it for itself with the entire roof being choked with weeds, grasses and vines as well as a flock of Taillow now making it their home. Why don't you clean it up? Bonus points if you can find some seeds to sow and start us a little garden of edibles.
Desert Pest Control
Threat Level: Yellow
The new HQ runs on geothermal technology for power with the core machinery in the basement of Trainer Hill however the pipes for it extend all the way into the desert on Route 111 to utilize the hot sands as a source of power. Unfortunately the local Trapinch and Sandshrew have been digging around the pipes and created large tunnels and burrows all around them, risking the stability of the pipes and the efficiency of the power generation. Get out there in the desert, chase them off and collapse their tunnels and burrows so that the pipes are completely covered again.
Provisions Run
Threat Level: Yellow, Orange if you run into SWIPE.
We have shelter now, and thankfully running water from a well, however we need food, unfortunately SWIPE is still searching for us so getting food won't be as simple as walking into town and going shopping, not unless you got a good disguise and money (the latter of which we have none). Find us food, be it via foraging for food in the wild or figuring out a way to get food from civilization, however you have to get us something to put food in our belly. Just try to avoid detection from SWIPE and most importantly don't lead them back to our HQ.
(Note: Ask for permission if you would like to catch or snag a Pokemon.)
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Posted: Thu Jul 17, 2025 9:28 pm
The Snagems needed to reclaim as much space as they possibly could. Oh, did they ever. Trainer Hill was a mess, the facilities were bare-bones, and the place had been inhabited in places by wild Pokémon. One of the few areas not yet identified for cleanup were Trainer Hill’s administrative offices from the days when it was a resort.
That’s how Monique found herself above the ground floor, on the level containing the arcade. Off to one side, easily unnoticed by guests in the resort’s heyday, were its corporate offices. There was just one problem: the door was still locked. And she sure didn’t have a key.
She reached for a Poké Ball and brought out Poloka, her Toxicroak. She pointed at the cherry-veneer door, surrounded by two plate-glass windows and a sign reading “ADMINISTRATIVE OFFICE” in gaudily gold letters. “Poloka?” The Toxicroak hopped and looked at her Trainer, a bit unsure of where she was. After all, this was the first time she’d come out in quite some time. “You think you can break that door open?”
“...Croak! Cro croooak!” ...Sure! Finally, I’m useful! The relieved Pokémon, still a bit confused about its environment, wasted no time in breaking down the door, tearing it into two fragments divided by a gulf marked by rough-edged wood and particleboard. At last, the impediment that had kept this section sealed from the outside world had been sealed. The stuffy and stale air once trapped inside now washed out, mixing with the air from the mezzanine. Monique flicked on the light switch located next to the entrance, her eyes rapidly adjusting from medium light to darkness to fluorescence. She recalled Poloka. Now that she was in, she wanted to tread carefully.
The first room visible was a reception area in a soft, light emerald color. It looked practically pristine, as if the company had just up and gone one day with the expectation it might return. An old-style tube television—antiquated by 2025 standards, maybe not by 2005’s—sat in a large cabinet in one corner. Chairs were lined up along the wall on several sides, and at the back were two hallways. In between was a large desk for a receptionist and behind that position on the wall a large logo. “TH Development Co. Ltd.,” it read around a stylized version of a six-sided emerald. It looked like a typical waiting room. “Well, well.” Her voice echoed off the eerie nothingness.
Monique picked up one of the brochures still sitting in a plastic rack on one side of the desk. “Trainer Hill, Hoenn’s New Resort Destination”, it declared in a lettering and art style that—were she born in this reality and still her age—might have been nostalgic for her. She opened it to see photos of the facilities in their prime and blocks of text describing the place that had long after become the interim home of Team Snagem.
"Trainer Hill, conveniently located near the crossroads of central Hoenn, is a new and exciting destination featuring the best in randomized battling as well as the finest in arcade and simulator facilities,” proclaimed the front left side of the brochure. “A project of the TH Development Company, Trainer Hill opened on September 16, 2004. Trainer Hill is expected to attract Hoenn's best Pokémon Trainers and serve as a standard-bearer for the growth of the League scene in this region.” A ribbon-cutting, showing a few faces she’d recognized from her previous trips and reading. “Trainer Hill features Hoenn’s first BattleSim system, as seen in Orre’s famous Realgam Tower. Patrons may rent discs that enable them to relive famous fights in Hoenn League history and to experiment with new and exotic styles of regional battling. The BattleSim system can reproduce the behaviors of Pokémon not normally available in Hoenn as well as unique battle styles such as Inverse and Rotation.” The volume reminded Monique of Snagem HQ’s Super Training Room, though with less fidelity in the graphics than she was used to. *Guess 2004 technology couldn’t handle generated weather*, she thought. The right side explained TheMaze™, another attraction. “No two visits to TheMaze™ are the same because TheMaze™ is built on randomizer technology with 64 unique layouts and even more variety of Trainers.” She could see renderings of different layouts the room could adopt.
The back side described some of the non-battle facilities of Trainer Hill. “And when battling isn’t enough, guests can enjoy world-class dining at our farm-to-table restaurant, Colina. World-class Unovan chef Shaun Pickel serves dishes inspired by our rooftop garden in an elegant setting with commanding views of the Hoenn desert, Chimney Valley, and Mauville.” Pickel’s smiling mug and pictures of the restaurant’s various dishes reinforced that the people who started Trainer Hill were actually trying. They might have spared some expense, but definitely not all of it. “Future phases of Trainer Hill are planned to include a spa and an outdoor amphitheater. Please look forward to them!"
That cheery optimism was a contrast to the abandoned office Monique now stood in. Something had gone *wrong*, but what? The receptionist’s desk still had a functioning computer, though the computer monitor looked ancient to her. It was deep, like an old television set, instead of a flat panel or even a holo-display. There were a few post-it notes huddled around the telephone, mostly about appointments and contacts long since irrelevant. She picked up the handset. There was no dial tone.
She decided to come back to this desk later and evaluate the situation. The remainder of the office area had six individual offices, an employee break room, and a bathroom, all in a U-shaped hallway that looped around.. *Well, there's a second toilet. That'll be a relief to Sub.* Starting from the left side, she first walked into the office still bearing the nameplate of the Director of Development, Sakura Cozmo. The desk was rather empty, personal effects probably having cleared away, but there were still papers left strewn around. Some were printouts of emails discussing closure plans. Others looked like legal proceedings. A third pile consisted of newspaper clippings and printed articles from the internet. The first one on the pile was from October 16, 2005, in the *Hoenn Financial Review*.
***
**Trainer Hill teeters**
*Battle Frontier's glitz leaves no room for TH DevCo as creditors advance*
Seven battle facilities are better than one. That’s the decided message that the competitive market has sent Trainer Hill Development Company, whose Trainer Hill battle hall and entertainment complex opened little more than a year ago. Instead of a hill, TH has dug itself a hole filled with red ink as the Battle Frontier attracts more serious battlers and is more satisfying to a wider variety of tastes.
“If Trainer Hill was going to exist with the Frontier, they’d have needed a much stronger day trip market or even a value customer. But the Frontier is offering much more value,” highlighted Kazuaki Suzuki, a financial analyst with the Hoenn West Coast Bank. “That is not happening. Their revenues are too low to sustain themselves. They had expansion plans, but they look inadequate and they don’t have the money to see them through.” Most sources recognize that attendance figures have not been good for most of the facility’s life.
On Thursday, the Kanto-based Maze Corporation, makers of the Maze technology that powers randomized rooms in the battle hall, sued TH in Mauville District Court, alleging it is owed millions of dollars in license fees for the use of its technology in the venue and that TH’s nonpayment has breached their contract. Maze’s technology was also used in the Trainer Tower in the Sevii Islands, which opened eight months prior to Trainer Hill and whose concept is widely credited with inspiring it. According to the lawsuit, TH is behind on payments in a 15-year technology licensing and usage agreement.
There has been talk in Mauville City that major food distribution companies are about to cut off the Colina restaurant for nonpayment, according to sources consulted by *HFR*. Its star chef, Unovan import Shaun Pickel, departed at the end of September and is known to have a restaurant project planned in Castelia City. The restaurant is continuing to use Pickel’s recipes until it finds another chef to revamp the concept.
***
Reading this article, even just the first few paragraphs, explained a lot to Monique. She had yet to visit any Battle Frontier but had certainly heard of them, with successful locations in Johto, Hoenn, and Sinnoh. They were battling mega-resorts with world-class facilities and loads of hotel rooms in more tropical settings. They were destinations. Trainer Hill was doomed from the start, like a Pokémon trainer that sends an Applin into battle.
The next office belonged to Aki Yokota, the Head of Operations. There were books and diagrams and building plans strewn all over this desk, left behind as Trainer Hill metaphorically sank into the desert sand. *Maybe this will be useful for fixing the place up.* There were also notes about other problems the facility had faced: discussions about banning one Vito Winstrate because he won too much and about barring a Pokémon named Electrode because “at low levels, it can take advantage of fixed-damage moves to assess disproportionately high damage”.
Further back was an office already emptied out, little more than a desk, a telephone, an office chair, and a guest chair remaining inside. Clearly, they had downsized some already. There was not much to see here, and that was after rifling through the drawers.
The bathroom looked like a bathroom, and the break room looked like a break room, with few furnishings other than a kitchen-type counter and a round table with space for four. Thankfully, it was devoid of food and stocked with appliances: a refrigerator, a microwave, and a sink. The refrigerator had been left unplugged, probably to save energy, and was adorned with workplace notes. There was one most unusual fixture: a Slurpee machine, with old labels for banana, cola, cherry, and blue raspberry. *Someone must have been tired of being hot in the office,* she thought, the air still remarkably stuffy. Everything was in good condition, probably because it had been only truly used for slightly over a year. It was just a matter of stocking the fridge and figuring out what was needed to supply the machine, though that wouldn’t be easy given their situation.
Inside the fourth office, of public relations manager Kiko Musashi, was a document, printed up on Trainer Hill Development Company letterhead, the last item on an otherwise spartan desk:
***
**NEWS RELEASE**
December 15, 2005
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Kiko Musashi, Media Liaison
096-551-7523
**TRAINER HILL TO CLOSE DECEMBER 21, 2005**
MAUVILLE, Hoenn — The Trainer Hill Development Company announces with deep regret that Trainer Hill will close its doors on December 21, 2005.
“We believed we had a vision to bring a world-class resort property to Hoenn,” stated Trainer Hill Director Andy Hartpence. “Unfortunately, circumstances have necessitated that we leave this vision behind for now. We thank those who contributed to this project since construction began on November 24, 2003, and our heartfelt gratitude goes out to the guests that have placed their trust in us over the last year-plus.""
Guests with reservations past December 21, 2005, and employees may call the hotline that has been set up at 096-551-7550 for further information on their situation.
The offices of the Trainer Hill Development Company will move to Mauville after the holiday season in order to attend to the winding up of the Trainer Hill property and any pending proceedings.
*About Trainer Hill Development Company*
Trainer Hill Development Company is the builder and operator of Trainer Hill, a world-class resort and battle facility near Mauville City, Hoenn. Trainer Hill features a full suite of entertainment and dining options alongside Hoenn’s only BattleSim and TheMaze experiences. For more information, visit trainerhill.gba.
***
There were few items on the desk, but there was a large filing cabinet in Kiko’s office. One entire file was filled with photos, a treasure trove of the history of Trainer Hill. In the earliest shots, construction crews with Machamp and even imported Conkeldurr were preparing the ground and operating cranes, hoisting steel beams into the air. Then there were images of what looked like a gala opening ceremony, with a ribbon cutting and formal dinner. Everyone looked happy. Everyone looked like they were optimistic that the building they had just opened would delight people and make them money in the process.
Unfortunately, as the press release bore witness, they ended up being painfully wrong. There were a few images, but as Monique looked through the file, the facilities and halls looked progressively emptier. There was a clipping from the *Mauville Shimbun* at the back of the file. It looked to be an editorial on Trainer Hill’s troubles. “Everything’s greater in Mauville, including the fiascos,” the headline read, going on and on to compare TH to Greater Mauville Holdings, one of the biggest business failures in the history of Hoenn. “The Battle Frontier Company put TH into a position from which it could never recover. The patrons never came in the numbers necessary to pay the bills. The maze closed in."
***
Office number five belonged to Yuki Noda, the head of finances. His office was empty, cleaned out thoroughly, as if someone had come and whisked away its contents long ago. (Unknown to the sheriff of New Po, they’d been moved to Mauville and then kept by law firms as the books were needed in TH DevCo’s bankruptcy case.) The last one was the chief human resources officer, a John Kihara, whose files were comparatively uninteresting: payroll, benefits, employees. Useful to someone, maybe, but not Monique.
She found herself back at the old computer. It had some sort of large apparatus on top for scanning cards. *Credit cards?* She turned it on to see what it might have. The terminal took a minute to boot, equipment that had been motionless for a whole era suddenly on the move again. Without warning, it spoke.
“Scan dot code,” a primitive-sounding (especially for Monique) computerized voice intoned. An arrow on screen pointed at the card device, the whole UI a callback to a bygone era. She realized she had no cards that would have operated this equipment and looked around in the drawer. There were still various office supplies all over. Toward the back, buried under a cube of Trainer Hill-branded sticky notes, was a small card. It was the same size of a playing card with a strip of data running along one side. Also printed on it was a low-resolution photo of a young woman and a name: Elise Ryosei.
“Scan dot code,” the system repeated, seemingly wanting to remind its absent-minded user to log in. Monique held up the card in the dim light, a thin piece of coated paper between two Zoroark hybrid fingers. She noticed the strip of data. _That must be a dot code._
She swiped it in the slot. “Welcome,” the computer chimed, booting up into an otherwise uninteresting desktop. Suddenly, an idea hatched in her brain. She ran down to the PC and withdrew her Porygon, summoning the Virtual Pokémon to float. She’d caught it in The Under, and now here it was in a very different battle facility, doing detective work.
“Enter this computer and collect all the data on the Trainer Hill network,” she commanded, pointing at the desktop tower to one side of the monitor. It fizzled into a series of dithered pink and blue twinkles and entered the computer. After a few moments, it rematerialized, playfully floating around. “Pory pory gon!” Here’s all the data, scanned for suspicious data and none found!
“Come with me.” Monique emerged from the office, now knowing how Trainer Hill failed and excited to mention the blueprints and other information that might lurk within, and walked down to the server room where GRAY was running. Porygon started communicating in high-frequency tones, efficiently passing data back and forth with GRAY. Its corpus would soon be expanded with information on the building in which they stood: CAD blueprints, stories of its failure and how the Battle Frontier was running rings around it, emails and 20-year-old Meowth memes.
Oh, and the second bathroom. And the Slurpee machine. The whole team might get a use out of that.
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Posted: Wed Jul 23, 2025 6:13 pm
Mission Clean up our new HQ Threat Level: Green We are thankful for the new HQ however the place is absolutely filthy, why don't you help clean it up? (Try to have fun with this mission and make it silly. For ideas maybe consider what wild Pokemon could have made this place their home while it was unoccupied? Maybe stuff left behind from when it was Trainer Hill? Maybe even remains from when that Shadow Pokemon smuggling ring was here? Could even do something with some of the Trick Master's renovations. You have almost total creative liberty so have fun with it.) “Is there ANYTHING resembling cleaning supplies here!?” I shouted from down the hall. “God, I’m becoming convinced that the Trick Master didn’t put any thought into any long-term future. Either that or he took the cleaning supplies with him because it was more useful than anything else here.” “I think I found some window cleaner!” Tristen shouted from around the corner. “How much?” “…half a bottle?” Tristen said. “Yeeaaah…keep looking.” I called back to him. “God, thy kingdom for some disinfectant. A mop maybe. An old rag!? Christ!” I said, frustrated, slamming the closet door. To say the least, I wasn’t in the greatest of moods. With Team Snagem routed from their headquarters, we had to make do with what we had. We were back in tough straits, not too similar to how the team was when Miles first brought the team together. Problem was, at the very least, Miles was a lot better prepared back then. Or should I say Sub, in essence, given what we know now. All the same, the warehouse out on the very outskirts of the Orre region was a place for those to rest their head and do so in comfort for the most part, more than what one would have thought at the time. It wasn’t luxurious by any means, but we easily made do. It was better stocked, prepared for a long haul. Trainer Hill, on the other hand, had nothing to it. Just the remains of a building, once a facility that many a trainer could battle at, later that an ambitious person wanted to convert to be a magna opus in puzzles and attractions so that became abandoned to time and opportunists. Until Sub managed to get a hold of it somehow and turned it into a panic headquarters. As I scavenged any random odd and end closet for anything that remained of previous tenants still in the building to at least make the floor semi-decent, I was left to wonder the logistics and viability of staying here. The whole point of a panic room, or in this case, headquarters, was to fill the role of what you needed it to for the short term. The intent of reclaiming what you once lost once all issues have been dealt with. And because of the main goal was to clear Team Snagem’s name and stick it to SWIPE, never mind find the person or faction that put us in this position and take them out of commission, the list of things to do to achieve that goal was staggeringly long, and to some extent insurmountable at the current time, and with really next to no leads as to where to investigate first. That’s never mind having to make sure some of those we left behind, such as Doc Owl, get out of the Mt. Silver headquarters in one piece. Or better yet, reclaim our actual headquarters. Here, Route 111 was a major traffic route that eventually branched off north through the desert and eventually leading into Route 113 and Fallabor Town, or it went west to Route 112, off to the Mt. Chimney area that housed Lavaridge Town. We weren’t exactly hidden here. Nothing like how we were in Mt. Silver for the most part. All it would take is a little effort on SWIPE’s part to just look. Hell, just a passerby could get curious and everything would go to crap. In spite of Sub’s confidence that the governing bodies in Hoenn was going to keep SWIPE tied up for some time, never mind what would probably be seen as a debacle on SWIPE’s part in the whole Aqua and Magma turf war stunt, I couldn’t say that such a thing would last for long. All the same, as long as we were here, he had to make do, just as with the warehouse in Orre. Only, we would have to put in a considerable amount more work. Some of the members who could change their appearance, such as Cera and Monique would be the only ones that would be able to go out with something resembling freedom to be able to get any sort of supplies that we need. Namely in that of food. The rest of us, however, would stand out extremely. Especially me, the so-called ‘Noble hybrid’. I had to sit tight here. Tristen was now a hot topic with SWIPE now as well. Agent WHITE certainly not all too happy with him after yesterday snagging one of his Type: Null. Though not exactly sitting on my laurels, and more so, not hovering over Freth and hoping she gets up sooner than later. That left me and Tristen for instance on cleaning duty. Sub pretty much imagined with how I tend to be in particular, he’d imagine that I’d clean the floors to the point that he could see his own reflection or eat off the floor. While I severely doubted it in spite of my meticulousness, since this place was pretty bad off, just making this place somewhat decent was going to be a tall order if we can’t find any sort of stash of cleaning supplies while we were at it. Probably we’re going to need to get Cera and Monique to start bringing stuff like that back. Though money was going to be an issue here as well, now that I thought about it. A testament to how much of us came unprepared. Moving through the building, I ended up making my way through the large room which where we had all our cots to sleep at night. As I walked through, in the midst of body odor and dust, I couldn’t help but to feel a bit depressed a little bit. More so as I made my way by the cot where Freth laid, still out from her fight with Kess and whatever hocus-pocus that Sub’s newfound doctor ended up doing on her to help her recover. My mind once again went back to Tristen’s scathing words to me around the Rusturf tunnel area on the back of Aile’s Steelix. I still find myself a bit irritated with it, having figured that Tristen knew my reasons for not going all out in such a fashion. I tried to focus more on skill, perhaps not too dissimilar to Kess, as opposed to raw power. Sure, I had raw power in spades. More than I had let on against Kess, admittedly. Maybe it was the matter that I underestimated what Kess was capable of. Especially now that she is with these white clad bastards. But was the answer just unleashing hell in such a fashion that Tristen was perhaps suggesting? I doubted it. I could had sworn I had taught him that power was not everything in a fight in the years that I have tried to raise him and teach him. Did that just go out the window in the past year he was in Paldea? I don’t know. I could only sigh. “I really need you right now…” I said to Freth, knowing she wasn’t hearing me, but it just stood to be told. I went back on the hunt for any cleaning supplies. I made my way down the hall, finding a set of double doors. I went to try to open it, only to find it locked. I sighed hard, my agitation once again coming to the surface. Figuring that it wasn’t like we were going to stay here forever, I made a hard yank, tearing the door handle off, pulling out the parts that made up the handle and pulled the door open. Inside, I took a look around, noting that it was a utility room of some kind. There were racks that looked like it was meant to shelve something electronic. Probably computer servers or something of the sorts. Spools of insulated wire were stacked, but not really tightly wound as if they were new spools. The wire was old and the plastic insulation was dry rotting. This was probably in the walls at one time that got pulled out when the Trick Master was trying to fix this place up. Probably intended to tossing it out, or maybe recycling it, but never got around to doing so due to his ambitions going up in smoke. I’d notice a janitorial cart which I immediately pulled out. There wasn’t much on it. Had a mop, accompanying bucket. A dust broom. A regular straw broom for those narrower spots. A half-used roll of garbage bags that I could put at the end of the cart since it had a nylon bag to put the garbage in. Unfortunately, there were still no cleaning chemicals. No bleach, no floor cleaner, not even a can of air freshener. “For the love of God…” Figuring that at least what I did find was going to be useful should we get started, I kicked the broken door handle pieces into the utility closet and closed the door. “Blizz, find anything?” Tristen walked over. “Nothing substantial yet other than maybe a few garbage bags.” I said. “Found this cart of stuff as well, but nothing to actually clean with. What about you?” “Apart from that window cleaner? Nothing much other than dust and lost dreams. Did Sub say how long ago the Trick Master tried to convert this building, because I’m thinking that it had been longer than what I originally thought.” Tristen at that point would take off his jacket, which was dirtied up from his digging around the building, taking a look at it. “Ugh…I didn’t think it’d get any messier than how the HQ was when we were off in Kalos for that bit of time. Galvantula probably would have loved hanging around in this place.” “Considering that Sub suspects there’s a Trapinch infestation near the heat pumps to power this place, I highly doubt it. At any rate, I think we might have scoured everything on this floor. We still got a couple of floors to check to see if there is some sort of housekeeping cache or whatever. Otherwise, Cera and all of them are going to have to make another trip.” I said. “The better question is will it be enough to even clean the building?” Tristen asked. “Just the first floor for now. I honestly don’t give a crap about any of the other floors. We’re not really staying here.” I said. “What makes you certain?” Tristen then asked. “Why should we?” I then asked. “Mt. Silver pretty much had everything Team Snagem needed. To just up and start over from the start trying to spend resources renovating this building that’s smack in the middle of a high-traffic route near one of the busiest cities in Hoenn? As soon as we deal with SWIPE and whoever put us in that position, we’ll head back to Mt. Silver.” “To clean up and renovate given how much SWIPE presumably damaged the place.” Tristen said. “Still in better shape and cleaner than this place. Never mind roomier. Or at the very bare minimum, not having to worry about a couple of dozen people all sharing the same hastily-made bathroom and hogging it for who knows how long.” “There is that, I guess.” Tristen said. “Though once Snagem is cleared and all of that, are you still going to stay around?” “Hm?” “Are you going to finally quit Snagem?” Tristen asked. “I don’t know. Maybe. Depends.” That only got a disappointed sigh out of Tristen. “What?” “That’s what you said after Lysandre and Ein. That’s what you said after the stuff in Unova. That’s what you said after we dealt with who we thought was Ein and those Cipher remnants. You know, the ones that got you back in to begin with after helping Miles.” Tristen said. “What needs to happen for you to finally stop? And, to Freth’s point, can you stop?” “Hey! At least at one point I tried to stop! Did I expect Ein to show up out of nowhere? Did I imagine Lysandre was just going to ruin everyone’s day? Did I expect the crap in Unova to spill over? Did I expect a couple of Cipher grunts to nearly freeze over Mahogany Town with a Chi machine? No!” I said. “But you jumped at the call anyways. Yea, you tried to stop after leaving Miles, because you didn’t have any reason to stay anymore. The team had already moved ahead off to Mt. Silver if I remember right at that point and after Miles realized that nothing else really needed to be done with the elementals, you just decided you were done, too. But then when those two stupid grunts decided to bring a Chi machine into Mahogany and tried to freeze it over, you jumped at the call almost instantly once you found out it was who Sub thought was Ein and didn’t stop since.” Tristen said. “At this point, either you gotten too used to all the fighting and stuff and can’t bring yourself to lower your guard, or you like this all too much. Which is it?” A pause came over the hallway, Tristen and I staring at each other with agitation all the present between the two of us. “Boy, you’ve been on a roll over the past two days now.” I said. “This isn’t about me, Blizz. Even after me being in school for a year, you haven’t changed or made any decisions or nothing. You’re still the same wreck from after Ein was beat at Realgam Tower.” Tristen said. “And since then, you still did nothing but trained and answered whatever minor call that needed to be done. And even then you couldn’t relax because you ended up having Eris come at you in Galar and nearly did you in there which just kept you going the same way. That time you spent on your own with your Pokémon in Paldea wasn’t really just a moment to relax for you, was it? It was just to train your Pokémon to hopefully get them caught up with the other, more experienced Pokémon like Weavile and Porygon-Z. At least close to it. I wonder if they actually picked up on that.” “Tristen, I’m going to warn you this is not an argument that you want.” I said to him. “Why, because you think I can’t handle it?” “Because you shouldn’t. Its not as cut and dry as you have been trying to make it for the past couple of days. I had thought I made that clear long before now.” “After seeing Freth yesterday, I’m not so sure about that anymore.” Tristen snapped back. After hearing some commotion from down the hall, other Snagems being close and started to sound like they were coming our way, both Tristen and I looked at each other. “Not the time.” “Fine.” Tristen said. The two of us continued on back on the hunt for any cleaning supplies. It was silent between the two of us making our way up to the next floor. As we went down a hall trying to find another closet to rummage through, a cabinet to scour, a shelf to search, Tristen paused for a moment, looking back behind him. No one was coming up behind the two of us. “So how about now?” Tristen asked. “You’re really going to do this?” I asked him. Tristen fast-pace walked in front of me to stop me, looking up at me dead in the eyes. “Blizz, I might not sense pressure like you do, but I know good and well that you were better than that. Electric weakness or no, Kess shouldn’t have gotten the better of not only just you, but Freth and Sol too that easily. Blame it on Kess’s skill to make up for the power gap all you want or ‘collateral damage’ all you want, it’s a moot point when everyone around you that is supposed to be counting on you ends up get taken out anyways. ‘Oh, sorry Sol, Sub, or whoever else, I got my reservations so get ready to take a couple extra lumps.’ Really!? Didn’t you tell me that the opponents are not going to have reservations to do whatever it takes to fight and beat me in fights like what we went through just yesterday!? Pretty believable after WHITE came out of nowhere and nearly took my head off with one of his Nulls’ attacks! And now, Freth is down stairs in a dusty room, on a barely stable, and if we’re honest, kinda uncomfortable cot, and who knows when she’s conscious again! You knew the stakes, right? Was everything that you told me and tried to teach me a lie!?” “That’s enough!” I snapped back. Tristen had to resist the urge to flinch, but he stood his ground, staring back at me. “Tristen, if nothing else, I did also tell you about responsibility about using your abilities. Please don’t tell me that just went out the window over the past year you were gone.” I said. “Oh, I remember.” Tristen retorted back. “Did you? Because I wonder if Freth would agree with that.” “I very well did. I probably could have very well have fought Kess and it probably would have been nasty between the two of us. But what was the mission, Tristen?” “Escape?” “And where was anywhere in there we needed to have an all-out brawl with them? Could we have done that?” “It doesn’t matter because SWIPE made it that way! Their mission was to capture us! The moment that at least Kess caught up with one of us, namely you, it became necessary just to run away again!” “And what good would it have done me to unleash the hell that you were talking about? Drop a massive sheer cold, unleash probably one of my fiercest Blizzard attacks, something that would undoubtedly not only catch Kess, but everyone in a rather large radius, that would be including Freth and Sol. You just said it yourself: Their mission was to capture us. I’d effectively be helping them at that point in the chaos. Tell Sol and Freth to run so I can go mono-e-mono with Kess? Do you honestly believe that they’d do that? We were a team, Tristen, in and of itself. I had to trust them just as much as they trusted me. Familiar, is it not? Never mind we couldn’t afford to have the team as a whole being all the more scattered than what we already were. Kess could keep me preoccupied long enough for more reinforcements to swarm me. And I might be able to take practically a whole army of those expansion suited idiots, but I couldn’t do it forever, never mind with Kess on my case along the way. And bear in mind too, there’s no telling what else they got under their sleeves, apart from those collars that we were stuck wearing for those couple of days. You also said it yourself yesterday, they counted on a lot of things when they came after us. That also hasn’t changed now – they’re counting on us to screw up royally at this point because we’re here trying to recollect ourselves and figure our next move while they’re probably distracted trying to deal with the Hoenn government. And they’re chomping at the bits to get us. The only way we make it out of this is if we take our next moves carefully and not going all out when it is not necessary.” “You call that not necessary when Freth ended up down stairs the way she is!?” Tristen snapped. “Yes!” I snapped back. “Do you think I liked that position I was in!? Hell no! Everything over the past few days were gambles upon gambles, Tristen! Even you getting yourself teleported here by that Phobos program thanks to Sub! It was the odds we had to bank on! Odds that nearly any one of us finds ourselves being here in the team! Ever since Ein did what he did, I am having to look at things at a lot of different angles. Angles that Freth herself ended up having to effectively slap into me…in a couple of cases, probably more literally than figuratively. Cutting loose like you are suggesting that I should have done effectively would have probably done more harm than good. Everything has been done as calculated as both she and I could do in the heat of the moment. And that’s not getting into the fact she made me promise to trust her more than I had before she ended up as a psychic; to not constantly push myself to those extremes and allow her to pick up the slack. That if anything should ever happen to her, that I would continue to do what needs to be done and move forward. It would absolutely suck on all accounts, hell it sucks now knowing that Kess did that to her. It is taking everything that I have right the hell now to not storm out that door and try to tear SWIPE a new one singlehandedly, never mind to finally off Kess for good for what she did to Freth. But I promised. And I am trusting her to make it through this. That woman is stronger than you honestly know, Tristen. To carry a wreck like me…she’s the hero here.” The two of us stared for a moment, then Tristen made a hard huff. As if he had more to say, but found it that it was no longer worth it. “Whatever.” He said, turning around and walking off. I sighed, shaking my head, then made my way off down the hall on the hunt for more cleaning supplies. After rooting through a couple of cabinets, I found myself at another utility closet for the floor. Forcing my way in, I started to search around the closet again for anything. “Augh…finally.” A few paper towel rolls, an industrial sized bottle of floor cleaner, a couple of bottles of window cleaner, a couple bottles of all-purpose cleaner with bleach additives and a jug of bleach itself. It wasn’t exactly going to clean this whole entire building, but maybe it would be enough to take care of the bottom floor for the time being. “Tristen!” I shouted down the hall to him. After taking a couple of items out of the closet giving it a look over, I started to realize something. I looked back around; there didn’t seem to be any movement. “Tristen!” I then called out to him again, knowing that he had heard me. Not much escapes those canine ears. “I’m coming, I’m coming!” Tristen called back, agitation present still. He was still sore over the conversation earlier, that was apparent. At least there was movement now. It wasn’t long before he was finally over to me. “You’re really going to be like this the rest of the day?” I asked him. There wasn’t an answer back. “Whatever.” I started passing over a couple of the items out of the closet. “Help me get all of this downstairs and on that cart so we can start taking care of business on the floor.” I stacked a good amount of things within his fingers and in his arms and then I started to take the rest that I could out of there. We’d carry the stuff down stairs and back down the hall where the cart was. We’d start loading the cart, putting the bottles, the towels, and so on where we could. “Alright, let’s start with the kitchen and work our way around so at the very least we got a clean place to keep food at. Cera and Monique should be back before long so we got at the very least a fridge to clean first if nothing else.” We would make our way to the kitchen and I couldn’t help but to just look around, looking at the surfaces to be scrubbed and mopped down. This alone was probably going to be a half-day ordeal at the very least. Tristen and I went to the cart, grabbed what we needed at first and went at it. Tristen would silently go off towards the back towards the bathroom where as I went ahead and decided to go to the fridge. Figured to get that cleaned up first since we were supposed to get food soon. As I went to the fridge, I got close to it and then stared at it in confusion. I gave a hard smell, something I hadn’t noticed really before. Probably because of me not really being in proximity to this thing, never mind being masked by the dusty smell the entire building seems to carry. “The…hell?” I silently said to myself. I suddenly got nervous, reaching over towards the door handle. As I slowly pulled the door open, the smell started to rush forth. A level of miasma unheard of in this day of age. My eyes started to go bloodshot as I started to look inside. Food stuffs left forgotten for ages, the filth left to seemingly take on a life of its own. I stared, mortified at the unholy chaos that would even make a Muk cry out in terror and in pleas for mercy. I quickly slammed the door, quickly ice beaming it shut then pulled the fridge away from the wall. I quickly grabbed the fridge, lifting it up and started to quickly carry it out as fast as I could try to fit it through door ways and hall ways, banging the walls along the way in my haste. The other Snagems still in the building stared, wondering what has gotten into me as I rushed through the halls in a near panic. “MOVE MOVE MOVE!” Out the front door, bumping into the door frame as I tried to frantically fit the fridge out the door, then once outside, rushed off to the side of the building, I gave the fridge a toss away; the ice giving way to the force once it hit the ground, the door flying open on impact, the filth exposed to the world. I quickly tossed out a Pokeball. “Blaziken!” I shouted. As the ball landed, Blaziken materialized. “FLAMETHROWER!” Blaziken was at first confused for that brief second, but once it too saw the mess from the depths of whatever abyss that was, it was more than obliged to do so, engulfing the fridge and burning it. One could almost hear a demonic squeal coming from the now burning fridge. The rest of the Snagems would find themselves showing up behind me only a brief moment later, staring in absolute confusion, Tristen alongside. I looked back to the rest of them as the fridge burned, tears in my eyes, bloodshot still. “What has been seen…cannot be unseen…” So much for having a cool place for food storage. With me now having to clean up a burning mess outside, Tristen would make his way back inside to the kitchen, picking up his cleaning supplies again off a counter in the kitchen and made his way back into the bathroom. He looked around and stared at it, getting a better look at it. “Man, this is smaller than my dorm room bathroom. And that was pretty small.” He said to himself. He started to get cleaning, working on the sink to try to scrub it down all he can, followed by the shower stall. The smell of cleaner and bleach started to fill the narrow confines, Tristen gagging a little bit, only for him to step out of the bathroom altogether for a brief moment to get comparatively fresher air. Once back inside, he would then start working on the single, solitary toilet the entire team unfortunately had to work with at the time being. Once flipping the lid up, he quickly slams it back down. “AUGH!” He flushes the toilet, grimacing. “COME ON! DID MANNERS GO OUT THE WINDOW WHEN I WAS GONE, TOO!?” He’d give it a second flush along side as a just in case notion and once it went through its whole flush cycle, he slowly lifted the lid to peek inside then finally got the lid back up. He would then proceed to start hosing down the toilet with one of the cleaner bottles, tempted to send out Magmortar to sterilize by fire. It was perhaps the best way to be sure. But perhaps sacrificing half of one of the limited bottles that we had would have to do. Tristen would start scrubbing down all he could of every inch, every crevasse it had, until the fumes of the cleaner started to become overbearing again. He had to step out once more to catch his breath again. And now, with him trying to work giving the headquarters as deep of clean as he can, he started to get hot as well, prompting himself to take off his jacket once again but this time throw it on a nearby counter. It was getting too hot now in this building for that, never mind with all the work he was doing. I would finally make my way back in, a little singed from the sudden fire that I made outside. The mess apparently didn’t want to go down without a fight, and smothering the fire afterwards wasn’t easy either I would find out the hard way. Tristen would catch a burning smell grace his nose coming from me. “Uh…I thought you were in the bathroom.” I said. “I was. Bleach smell.” He said. “Oh.” “What was that whole thing with the fridge for?” Tristen then asked. “My nightmares are no longer going to be filled with the horrors we face out there under the Snagem banner or Celcius or anything like that. It is going to be…that…” I cringed hard, gagged once again. I could smell it still in a way. The smell ingrained in my senses. To the point I could effectively taste it. I retched just then, followed by more cringing. “How…why…just…QUESTIONS! QUESTIONS I WILL NEVER GET ANSWERS TO!” “Do you really want to know?” Tristen asked, staring in confusion. “Was whatever in that fridge worth the closure?” A string of silence filled the kitchen for about a few seconds. “Fair point.” After another moment, Tristen went back into the bathroom to try to finish it off where as I went ahead and started to tackle the kitchen. I grabbed the roll of paper towel I had intended to use on the fridge and the cleaner that I had and went on ahead to start working on everything else…well, everything that was left. It would start simple enough, scrubbing down the countertops as best as I could. Much so that I had to try to do it twice over. The first go at it took off a layer of dust that effectively turned the paper towels black. The second go, nowhere as bad, fortunately. The cabinet surfaces were next, nothing to write home about there. Then finally inside the cabinets, wiping them down as well. I then went to open yet another cabinet to clean the inside out, but when I opened it, the door literally came off its hinges. “AAA! What…what the hell?” I asked. Tristen peeked out of the bathroom, staring in confusion. “What happened?” “I ended up taking the door off the hinges!” I said, staring at the door in my hands, trying to figure out where it all went wrong. “Did it have an opinion?” Tristen asked deadpan. I gave a deadpan look back. “You are really trying my patience now…no. It came off on its own…and…” I would see where the hinge was allegedly screwed into the door…only to see that the door had…seen more than its fair use. “This door had been reused over and over. Someone tried to screw in this door over and over again and practically gave the hinges not much to grab on to.” I said to Tristen. “Honestly…what kind of corners did the Trick Master cut when he tried to renovate this place a while back ago?” I asked. “We really can’t stay here…my God…” I said, tossing the door onto the counter in front of me. Tristen shook his head at the matter as did I. He would go back into the bathroom to try to finish cleaning it off and I went back to wiping down the insides of the cabinets. With a sigh, I went off to the cart, grabbing the broom and started to sweep at the floor. Good news, no fridge in the way to get around. I swept furiously at the floor, trying to get all the dust and dirt I could out of every corner, against baseboards, and the like, following up with tossing it all out in the garbage bag we had out to toss our dirty, used paper towels in. I would then walk over back to the cart, grabbing the mop bucket and mop. “Tristen, you done in there yet?” I called out to him in the bathroom. “Mostly…don’t have the floor clean yet.” Tristen said. “I’ll take care of that. Go ahead and see about getting that area where we slept at last night if you got nothing else in there.” Tristen would take another minute before he made his way out of the bathroom then start making his way out of the kitchen to the where the cots laid out for the Snagems to rest on. Tristen would make his way there with a bunch of paper towels and what remained of the bottle of cleaner he had. Some walls to wipe down. Probably need to get the broom in here too. As he took a smell of the air in the room, it made him wish if only a little that an air freshener could have been found somewhere in this place. As he made his way by the cots, he took notice to Freth still passed out on her cot, still trying to recover from the injury she took from Kess. He looked back towards the way he came then gave a sigh out of frustration, then went on to start straightening up the makeshift sleeping area. He walked off, starting to wipe down the area the best he could. A whole time-consuming affair. Though as he continued to do so, he couldn’t help but to glance back at Freth, part of him hoping that Freth would wake up himself, perhaps in hopes that she could give his adoptive father a hard chewing out for putting her and Sol in that situation. The pile of paper towel started to stack until Tristen was out of the roll. He’d leave for the moment to go back for a garbage bag and also came back with the broom and dust pan as well to start getting to work on the floor. Once he stashed the used paper towels, he would go ahead and just start trying to get the floor ready to be mopped. He’d have to move everyone’s cots aside just so he could get to the floor and much to his dismay, the more he started to uncover, the more he was astounded just what they were effectively sleeping in during the night. Though honestly, no one could care too much. They were exhausted after the encounter with SWIPE. He started to get about half-way through the room until I would show back up with the dust mop. I noticed Tristen had been moving everything around just so he could actually clean the room, which was fine. It had to be done. “Where did you get at so I can give it a once over with this?” I asked. “Just from here to the wall. I haven’t gotten over that way yet.” He said, motioning towards the opposite wall, towards Freth. “Alright.” I would carry the flat dust mop off to the end of the room and start giving it the once over as I said. Tristen wasn’t really saying anything still at that point; me seeing that he was trying to still hold his tongue, especially now that we were down near everyone else in the team, never mind close to Freth. I wasn’t going to say much of anything, though. I was going to just let him stew, certain that he probably didn’t believe what I said earlier, or at least all of what I said. Tristen stopped sweeping for a minute, perking up then looking around. “…?” I noticed Tristen’s confusion, staring in confusion at him in particular. “What is it?” “Do you hear that?” I would stop and start looking around, giving it a good ten to fifteen seconds. “No…?” I said. Tristen would walk off to look around to try to get a bead on what he was hearing. My guess was something he was able to hear something I wasn’t. He stared at the ceiling, rather suspiciously at that, for a few seconds then started to reach up to the ceiling with the broom. He’d poke a ceiling tile to see if there was anything going on. Much to his shock, something fell out in a near blur and with a loud hiss; a rather large bug. “YAAH!” Tristen shouted, flailing, caught off guard over the notion. I looked over to see a Nincada that was trying to scurry off himself out of fright over the Manectric hybrid’s panic. I quickly fired an ice beam and iced the bug. I walked over, picking up the bug-cicle and sighed out. “Aw, I think he liked you.” I said to Tristen. All it got was a grunt out of the teen. I gave it a look over and just shook my head. “Well, I can tell this isn’t Aile’s at the very least. Too small.” I said. “Though I wonder what he’s doing in the freakin’ ceiling…or if there’s more…” I said. “This place was taken over by a bunch of people that was trying to run a Shadow Pokémon ring out of here, right?” Tristen asked. “That thing isn’t Shadow, is it?” “I’m not sensing anything off. You smell anything?” I asked. “No…” “Well, that’s good news, I hope. Though unfortunately, I don’t have any Pokémon that could fit up there anymore other than Rotom. But all of his Ghost attacks, other than a Confuse Ray and Will-o-wisp, are relatively high powered and might end up destroying the ceiling…and electric attacks are out the window.” I said. “And anything I might have is probably too heavy to try going through the ceiling.” Tristen said. “Great. We might need to see if we can’t get Aile on the job on that one. She’d be able to maybe even scope them out a heck of a lot easier than we can so we don’t have to go on a wild Ducklett chase for them. Did she go off by chance somewhere?” “I don’t know.” Tristen said. “We’ll have to catch up later then with her. I suppose in the meantime keep a listen out for them.” I said. Tristen would go on, practically looking over his shoulder more so out of caution than anything else, as he went to go finish off sweeping the floor. The one bug that he couldn’t outright electrocute. Great. After the sweeping and mass moving of the cots out of the large room, all but the one that Freth laid on that is, it was time to mop once again. It was silent there for the most part; the most that could be heard was the clamor of the other Snagems elsewhere, talking it is whatever they’d talk about. Plans to deal with SWIPE, keeping a look out for unwanted company, so on. There wasn’t much going on between Tristen and I. Tristen was still clearly sore over earlier topics, never mind over the past day and a half. I already had made my peace with the whole situation and if it made me look terrible, then so be it. Tristen started to tie off a garbage bag full of the dust, dirt, and cleaning waste, but something bothered him, looking back at me for a moment. “What was that promise, exactly?” Tristen spoke up. “Hm?” “You said you promised Freth. What happened? When?” he asked. “Oh…started back in Galar during that tournament.” I said. “Shortly after you and some of the others went down in that den. Nearly had a panic attack off of that. Mind, if you remember, this is relatively fresh off of dealing with Ein. Not much was said on that, but it didn’t escape Freth’s notice. Then my near death experience over that blasted hunter using Hinterbane on me. Didn’t really help a whole lot in the grand scheme of things. In the interim of that, if you remember, Freth kept that whole thing about Eris being concious in Freth’s mind to herself.” “But then the headquarter’s Claydol and then Reno blew that wide open.” Tristen said. “At that point, Freth and I had an argument later on over how she kept it secret, mostly out of fear of Eris possibly taking her over somehow and trying again. Something that I wouldn’t put past any psychic, regardless of what they tend to specialize in.” I said to Tristen. “Freth ended up calling me out about needing to put more faith in others and don’t put myself on the front lines all the time. That there are some things that having a super strong hybrid wasn’t going to fix. Both she and even Teacher called me out on something that I still don’t really have an answer to: do I not trust others to stand up where I am not around? Do I have so little faith in people to put up the fight where it counts the most. Truth be told, I honestly want to, and if I can’t, I make it a point to go out of my way where I can to make sure that people can. Rather they be here in Snagem or elsewhere. But with the increasing ferocity of threats…like SWIPE for instance, it…makes it exceedingly difficult. Freth made me promise that no matter what that if anything would happen to her in particular, that I keep moving forward. Do what needs to be done. Don’t dwell like I have been known to do. Until that time, to give her space, allow her to actually work, allow her to at least try to get up there in power like I have, especially now since she’s got psychic power to try to figure out.” “And this has anything to do with your holding back because?” Tristen asked. “If she was to go, I rather not be the one that caused it to happen. The same goes for anyone, really.” “What difference does it make if you accidentally do it or someone does it deliberately?” Tristen asked. “This has nothing to do with Eris’s doom ‘prophecy’ when she came and attacked you, is it?” Tristen asked. “No. I can’t bring myself to believe I’m that powerful or even capable of doing that.” I said. “Can I crank out a lot? Yea. Sure. Hell, I could change the weather outright for a little while in an area. Something to a lot colder, mind. Bring about snows and such. But to affect the world over like she suggested? I’m not an Elemental.” I then snapped my fingers. “That actually reminds me…needed to ask Sub about the hell did I sense out of him when we were in that office in Devon Co. After getting here, I was too exhausted and frustrated to ask, never mind remember at the time.” Tristen couldn’t help but to make another frustrated huff. “I don’t understand. All these years of you training me and now its not making a lot of sense anymore, and I am having a hard time believing me just being in school done something.” “You being in school has nothing to do with it. Not directly, at least. A factor, perhaps. It all boils down to…nuance, for lack of a better term. I’m pretty sure you are trying to figure out the meaning of it all, the reasoning of it all, because before, you effectively went with the flow. It was simply a ‘Okay’ and you did what you were told. You had to. We were doing missions for Snagem that had severe consequences should we fail. You knew that things were done for a reason and you had no reason to question it a whole hell of a lot. If it worked, why bother asking questions? Borderline soldier mentality, which if we’re being honest with ourselves, you shouldn’t have been put through. But over the past year, you were left alone for the most part; the only thing you were told to do was just simply attend and pass your classes. Barring that? Free to do whatever. Make friends with whoever, take part in whatever, short of getting yourself in trouble with law enforcement or something.” I told him. “You ended up realizing out there, things weren’t cut and dry like how you were taught not just by me but by anyone in Snagem. Something I unfortunately have to admit that I was poor in teaching you, if nothing else. And because of which, perhaps in a way, you slowed down in growing up finally after being effectively rushed to mature in mindset, let alone power. Not that it’s that bad of a thing, really. You didn’t get that opportunity to really be a kid that much. Not that much of an opportunity to explore, less so when Tails went up and out of here and went back to Miles. You did have trouble adjusting to being with others your age, after all. I distinctly remember about you overly nervous being around your peers there. But now, as you explored, learned, then looked back, comparing back then to now…now you find yourself questioning a lot of things. How things done and why. Even now, like this whole thing with Freth or my compulsion to ‘hold back’.” “Is it really all that is?” Tristen asked, skeptical over the explanation. “Just me…getting a few new insights being out on my own?” “Probably not all of it.” I admitted. “You’re probably not fully wrong…there was probably more that I could have done. But I don’t know what I should have done. The past few days were nothing but being put in one hard place after another with no reprieve. But all I can do is keep going. What happened had happened and I can’t change it. I got to keep going. For everyone’s sake. Including Freth’s.” I said, walking over to the mop bucket and dunking the mop in. “Otherwise, if nothing else, if I don’t, Freth’s probably going to be twisting my arm with her psychic power once she get up. It’s apparently her new favorite thing since Frustration attacks. Turning someone into a living pretzel…its actually disturbing the more I think about it.” “I’ll…take your word on that Freth thing…” Tristen said, shifting his eyes towards the resting Freth. It took a little while, but finally the floor in the sleeping area was finally mopped. It wasn’t perfect, as it was sort of expected, but at least it was better than how it was before we showed up here. Tristen and I started to move the cots back in and laid them out, ready for them to be slept in tonight. Tristen was left to his thoughts as the two of us done so, trying to still make sense of what was just talked about. In a way, it still sounded hypocritical, if not contradictory to him. He started to realize that he probably was not going to get the answer he was looking for. Perhaps he was going to have to wait until Freth got up still like he originally planned to. It was what it was however. Once the cots were laid out, the two of us would then find our way into the lobby area nearby the entrance. Just as before, Tristen and I would start trying to get the floor cleaned up, the walls wiped down, though at this point the all-purpose cleaner started to run out as did the paper towels we were so dependent on. We would end up having to cut our losses and just focus more on the floor. At least the floor cleaner could be better stretched. It would take a while, but the two of us, in spite of the arguments finally got done cleaning at least the bottom floor. The smell of bleach still lingered, but it was what it was. Better than what we were effectively living in. “God, a shower sounds good about now…” I said to Tristen. No arguments out of Tristen about that, feeling that he could use one himself after all of that. Though really, there wasn’t much out of the Manectric teen at all. Tristen remained silent and as I looked over at him I could just about see the conversations still rattling in his mind. “You’re still skeptical.” “I can’t help it.” Tristen said. “I keep wondering if you misunderstood whatever Freth had you promise for. Sure, she might have told you to keep going on if anything happened to her in the fight and stuff, but I can’t bring myself to believe she also meant at the same time for you to sandbag and risk putting her in danger. Like if that fight still could have been avoided with Kess.” Tristen said. “Or rather, if there was a fight, there really wouldn’t be one. Even if she was as skilled as you claim she was, there’s only so much that skill can make up for. And that’s not getting into the fact that you still had Sol and Freth there, which really, with you saying that you rather don’t be the one to cause an accident in fights, that would make it look like they were holding you back and getting in the way of dealing with Kess.” Tristen said. “I’m thinking there is something else that you’re not telling me. Is it something Freth knows about?” “You’re fishing in an empty pond, Tristen.” I said. “Am I really? You have to admit, it was yours and Freth’s fault for getting me to try to pick apart every little thing a person does to study cues to be able to talk to people let alone win fights in that fashion.” He asked. He would give yet another frustrated sigh. “Blizz, I’m going to make a promise to you. If I find out that any Snagem, let alone Freth, ended up getting hurt again or worse? Because you decided to hold back? I am going to give you a reason to not hold back.” Tristen said. I slowly turned my head, needing a eyebrow raise once again, caught completely off guard from Tristen’s proclamation. “…did you honestly just threaten me?” “ Promised you.” Tristen said, making his way away, shaking his head in disgust as he left. I sighed out myself, scratching the back of my head for that brief second. This whole incident so far has brought out the worst in people, for certain. Fights between Snagems, stress of being attacked at any time, never mind surviving period in less than stellar conditions. In Tristen’s case, between probably being effectively robbed of time in the classroom and his incomprehension of the situation he is seeing unfold is not doing him justice. This was well beyond him just growing up…this was completely something else. “…we need out of here…” I said to myself, walking off myself.
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Posted: Wed Jul 23, 2025 9:11 pm
Desert Pest Control
Threat Level: Yellow
The new HQ runs on geothermal technology for power with the core machinery in the basement of Trainer Hill however the pipes for it extend all the way into the desert on Route 111 to utilize the hot sands as a source of power. Unfortunately the local Trapinch and Sandshrew have been digging around the pipes and created large tunnels and burrows all around them, risking the stability of the pipes and the efficiency of the power generation. Get out there in the desert, chase them off and collapse their tunnels and burrows so that the pipes are completely covered again.
—
Aile would find herself in the desert of Route 111 once more, having been here quite a long time ago as the Shadow Virus outbreak was taking over Hoenn. This time, the overarching circumstances were no less dire for the Snagems, but they weren’t having to deal with wild Shadow Pokémon here on their way to secure the legend that once resided here, so that was a positive. It was just collapsing the burrows and tunnels some of the subterranean Pokémon here made around the pipes they used for geothermal energy to Trainer Hill. “Arceus, does this place bring back memories. I wish I had my goggles, though.”
The woman brushed her fingers over the five Pokéballs on her belt, focusing on a couple of them more. She kept Poggle, Sarlaac and Tatooine, but Kuat, Dagobah, and Kayvaan had gotten traded out. She didn’t think she needed Kaas, the Bloodmoon Ursaluna, for this, but having another hard hitter on the team in case of severe complications wasn’t a bad thing. However, Eisley could be the most helpful of the newcomers, with the Excadril’s digging capabilities potentially useful to help collapse the tunnels. It helped that he was much smaller than Kuat, and thus could be more precise and avoid damaging any of the pipes. Her Nincada could possibly help with that as well. He hadn’t done much in their escape, the worst thing being taking the effect of Sub’s Galarian Moltres. Sighing while squinting through the perpetual sandstorm, she would grab Eisley’s Pokéball and send out the digging mole, who looked around and then up at his trainer. “Hey Eisley. Think you could help me out with something,” she asked, kneeling down to Eisley’s level.
“Ex? Ex ca dri.” The mole crossed his arms and looked a little curious, wondering what was in it for him.
“A place to stay with power. Some things went down, and now we’re in emergency mode. We’re taking care of some tunnels near pipes, specifically collapsing them. The tunnels, not the pipes. Think you can do that?”
Eisley thought for a moment, then nodded. Having a safe place to stay was always convenient. “Ex ca dril dri dril?”
“Yeah, you’ll get some help.” Her hand went for Poggle’s Pokéball, though, it lingered on Tatooine’s as well. It would turn out that she decided on both, sending out Tati and Pogs. “Poggle, you’re going to help Eisley here. Also, Eisley, this is Poggle. Poggle, Eisley. You both like playing in the dirt, so hopefully you two’ll be friendly. Friendly enough, at least.” She’d look to Tatooine, who was curious about where they were. “Tati, you were here when you were infected with the Shadow Virus. You… actually dealt with the Trapinch here as well during that time, as well.”
“Goon?” The Flygon tilted her head, looking somewhat hurt. She didn’t really remember a whole lot of what she did while infected, and hearing that she was here while infected didn’t really give her a great feeling.
“They were infected as well, to be honest, so it was going to get vicious one way or the other. It’s okay Tati. We’re well past that now. Other than the occasional Shadow Pokémon smuggler.” The woman would rub Tati’s snout, who tilted her head before smiling and leaning into it. The pair would pause as soon as they felt something through the sand, though, the four looking around them as the sand started to shift and dimple. Soon, many many tan heads would appear around them, maws opening wide as they started making their way towards them. This appearance would give a sort of deja vu to Aile, remembering suddenly how the Trapinch had swarmed the team on their way to Regirock’s ruins. “Tati, Eisley, you two think you could help?...”
Eisley looked ready to fight, but Tatooine… She looked a bit more unsure, and her trainer picked up on that, giving her dragon a questioning look. Something that Aile didn’t really pick up on initially was that Tati was also beginning to remember some things. The Trapinch swarming them was pulling out memories from the Shadow Virus haze, when she was here with Aile fighting them off. The Flygon remembered not caring about anything, only the feeling of wanting to attack the smaller Pokémon, put them in their place, and show them who’s boss. Which, that wasn’t her. Not how she would have reacted, were she in her sane mind. However, she did do that, and she felt conflicted about the situation now. Tatooine could see how some of them even shied away from her when they saw their fully evolved form, making her think some of them may have remembered her as well.
Something else felt off to the Flygon as well, though… Why were there so many in such a small area? While she was a Trapinch, she tried to keep some amount of space between her and others of her species, give herself room to catch other Pokémon without having to fight too hard. These guys… this felt like quite a lot of Trapinch. Was something driving them out? “Gon, fly fly gon? Gon gon fly.”
Aile would turn her head to Tati as the sand dragon spoke to her unevolved kin, wondering what she was planning on. This situation initially seemed cut and dry, but the trainer could pick up on her partner’s emotions, how she was conflicted about fighting her evolutionary kin. So, Aile would elect to see how this played out, motioning for Eisley to stand down for the moment. She would do the same with Poggle, but the Nincada decided to make his home on her back instead of fight, so he was already deciding not to fight. When Eisley returned to Aile’s side, she would bring her attention back to Tatooine, who was now having a discussion with the swarm of Trappinch about why they all were there. From everything Aile could pick up on through Tati, she was trying to see why they were there and what they could do to help them.
“Trap in trapinch inch inch! Tra trap!”
“Gon? Gon gon gon. Fly gon fly flygon!” After confirming something with them, Tati would take off north, with Aile only pausing a second before following the Flygon out, though it wouldn’t be long before she could only track her by the direction the melodic hum that Flygons made flying in a sandstorm was coming from.
“Dammit, Tati… Eisley, see if you can’t find her further ahead. Whatever she's getting into, she might need the help. Go!” The drilling mole nodded and dove into the sand, spinning away. Aile paused and put her hand on her right knee, taking a few breaths. “I still don’t think I’m fully rested from our escape. Arceus… Poggle, if you’re out while I’m trying to pull a stunt like that again, get me to stop in some way.” The woman would close her eyes and take a few deep breaths, keeping an ear out for the Desert Spirit’s Song and how far away it was drifting. This wasn’t the first time she had tracked Tatooine by that music, and this time, if whatever she was doing or dealing with was grounded, she also had her tremor sense to help track that as well. Though, it wasn’t as great with the sand, always shifting with the wind, and in general being loose. Also, she left her artifact back at Trainer Hill, taking as many precautions as she could to keep herself from channeling after sharing energy with Kuat, so that was also probably further weakened. Still, those were the tools she had to catch up while she caught her breath, so she couldn’t really complain. “Right, let’s get to it.” Poggle would buzz happily as his trainer would start again, following the music. While it faded during her break, it never fully disappeared, so that at least told her that Tatooine wound up stopping finally. “Must have found what she was looking for. Hopefully.”
Using the music as her guide, she would start making her way through the desert, noting that the sand seemed to bother her even less than usual, even without her protective goggles. She still had to squint to see, trying to keep the stronger winds from drying out her eyes, but the sand hitting her face bothered her less, and it seemed like she wasn’t worrying about any of it getting into her nose and mouth, at least when she wasn’t talking much. Maybe it was a boon of her channeling, maybe something specific between her and Tati, maybe she just didn’t remember well what it felt like the other times she was in a sandstorm. Something to keep in mind after all of this insanity with SWIPE was over.
Aile would come to a stop as she wound up encountering something she wasn’t quite expecting to see. Eisley lay on the ground, a couple of decent sized gashes on him as he lay motionless. “s**t! Eisley, you okay? You with us still?” As she ran over to him, the drill mole would start to stir and attempt to get up, realizing his trainer was nearby. That, however, would prove not the greatest idea, as a couple of small blue fins poked out of the sand and began to head straight for them, followed by one larger one. “Those look like…” There wouldn’t be too much time to think it through, and the two smaller fins would jump up to reveal themselves as Gibles, while the large on jumped to to reveal itself as a Garchomp, all three of them ready to chomp down on the delectable meals that were Aile and Eisley. Poggle probably only counted as a snack. “Dammit, Poggle-”
Aile wouldn’t have a chance to finish her command to the Nincada, as a green striped tail with three large scales at the tip would swing into the two smaller Gible, sending them flying before the dragon it was attached to came in to headbutt the other dragon, knocking it back down to the ground. As Aile looked Tatooine over, she could see a bunch of cuts and bite marks on her, realizing she must have been dealing with other Gible, at least, before making her way over here. “Huh… This Garchomp and the Gible might be the reason there were so many Trapinch in one area,” Aile surmised, dragging Eisley back a bit. Thankfully, the mole stirred more and shook himself as soon as he got to all fours. On closer look, his wounds weren’t terribly serious, and the Excadrill looked like he was willing to fight more. However, between him and the Garchomp that wanted to eat him was Tatooine, who let out a roar of anger. “Alright Tati, Dragon Claw,” Aile commanded, pointing to the hammerhead dragon.
Tatooine didn’t need to hear the command twice, charging forward with her claws glowing blue. The Garchomp would jump up and attempt to Slash at the Flygon, but she managed to dodge the talon of the dragon and retaliate with her own claws, sending the Garchomp down to earth. Instead of trying to fight back, however, the dragon dove down into the sand, deep enough to hide the fin. “s**t… Tati, keep on your toes. Eisley, Earthquake!” The Flygon would keep an eye out for anything with her position in the air, while Eisley shoved his claws into the ground and poured energy in to create an Earthquake in the sand, disturbing anything nearby underground. A couple of Gible would pop up out of the sand, caught off guard by the sudden violent vibrations, made stronger by Eisley’s affinity for sandstorms, but the Garchomp was nowhere to be seen. This worried Aile, until she caught notice of a set of vibrations coming from underneath her. And coming closer fast. “Eisley, watch out!”
The Garchomp would finally emerge, slamming into Eisley with ferocity and almost a look of hunger in its eyes. The Excadrill would be knocked off of his feet once more, sliding around on the sand and tumbling around. The Garchomp would once again try for its prey, darting forward, until once again, Tatooine would play interception. “Dragon Rush,” Aile ordered once she saw her Flygon zoom in, her dragon charging herself with draconic energy and slamming into the Garchomp. However, it would use this point to dig its spikes into Tatooine, keeping a hold of her as the winged dragon continued to fly.
“Goooooon!” Tato would barrel roll to try and get the Garchhomp off of her, who bit down into her shoulder and neck in an attempt to keep on. This Garchomp was going to stay on for as long as it could, trying to inflict as much damage to the Flygon’s body as it could before finally having to let go. It did though, and left a nasty looking wound where it finally let go. Aile saw it and grimaced, noting that it was going to have to get looked at once they got back.
“Dammit all… Wait. What’s it doing?”
“Gar…. CHOOOOOOOMP!” That sound would be a rallying cry for the pack of Gible it commanded, calling the others back up and even bringing forward quite a few more. It didn’t take long for Aile, Eisley, and Poggle to be surrounded by the Gible, while Tatooine faced down the Garchomp once again. Aile would look at their situation and take a sharp breath, trying to figure out of this encounter. She would reach for Sarlaac’s Pokéball when-
“FLYGOOOOOON!” Tatooine would let out a cry of her own, hoping that maybe, just maybe, some of those Trapinch might come if she called for help. “Fly gon fly fly, gon flygon fly!” That would cause all of the Gible and the Garchomp to pause for a second, waiting for something to happen. After about a minute of nothing happening, the Garchomp smirk and cry out again, rallying the Gible and charging in itself. However, what it thought was going to happen and what actually happened wound up being two different things.
Aile felt some sort of vibrations soon before the Gible were supposed to come at them, and while one was still charging at them, most seemed like they were slipping. Slipping? The sand under them was starting to shift down into a center point, with the little land shark dragons doing their best to try and escape. They wouldn’t, though, and would get dragged down into the sand by a tan maw that poked out when the Gible were about half way down the sand trap. The Garchomp paused its charge to look around, confused, while Eisley stepped forward and Slashed at the Gible coming at them, getting knocked back as well. A few more tan heads would poke their heads out of the sand(and was that a dark green one?), all of them looking at the remaining Garchomp and Gible with hungry eyes of their own. Tatooine would come charging in with her tail glowing royal blue, not giving this giant land shark a chance to flee before she used Dragon Tail, the power of it sending the Garchomp flying further back than Aile would have expected from a tail slam, with Garchomp getting up slowly and scurrying away quickly after that.
The trainer would let out a sigh of relief as the Trapinch and Tatooine cheered, looking down to Eisley. The mole winced slightly as he moved, probably something from his wounds. “You gonna be okay?”
“Dri?” He looked over to Aile, then crossed his arms and huffed. “Ex ca. Ex ex ca dri.” Of course he’d be fine.
“Good. Alright then. I’ll see if there’s a healing station back… where we’re at,” she paused part way through, not wanting to give anything away just in case they were being watched somehow. “Let’s see what Tati’s up to.” The trio would walk up to Tatooine and the small group of Trapinch that hung around after everything was said and done. “Tati?”
“Gooon? Gon!” Tati would spin and hug her trainer, though she would wince as that unpleasant bite wound in her flared up. “Fly gon?”
“It seems like you’ve befriended some of them. You think they could see about collapsing the tunnels around the pipes? I… doubt they’d take orders from me.” Aile rubbed the back of her neck a little nervously, giving a small chuckle. Tatooine, for what it was worth, nodded and turned to her newfound Trapinch friends.
“Goon. Fly gon gon fly fwy gyon. Gyon fly fwy?” Tatooine would briefly explain the situation to her smaller evolutionary cousins, tilting her head once she asked them for help. The Trapinch looked at each other for a moment, worried. “Gon gon fly! Flyyyy gon gly fly.” She would do her best to explain where they needed to collapse the tunnels, specifically the ones with metal tubes inside them. Finally, it would seem like they came to a decision.
“Trap… inch! Tra trap!” They all nodded and burrowed back underground, and Aile could briefly feel the vibrations leave their area as they headed back towards the tunnels, Tatooine following behind them quickly. That would leave her with Eisley and Poggle again, and Aile would take a deep breath.
“Well… We’ll go in and check it out in a bit. Let’s catch our breath for a moment, though.” Aile would close her eyes briefly and take another deep breath, before opening them again and noticing a silhouette in the distance. “Is that… Huh. This desert had the temple to Regirock… You knew the entire time, didn’t you, Korriban?” A half grin would grow on Aile’s face as she thought about that time, so long ago. The other Snagems worked and fought for her to get a chance to capture one of the legendary golems, and it called her out on being a ground channeler long before she actually got her artifact. Maybe not that specific working, but it did call her out before everything had happened. Before she even truly knew. “I’m working on that now, finally. I might have been slow to get going, but we’re starting to push forward with our potential. I hope I’m not a disappointment to you like I might be to others.”
“Ex?” Eisley would look at his trainer, confused and slightly worried, while even Poggle would poke his head around to look at Aile.
“Don’t worry about it guys. Let’s go.” Aile would start walking with her Pokémon once more, though her thoughts still lingered on Korriban. Currently, he was tucked away in her staff, at the head, back at Trainer Hill. The last time she brought out the Regirock, though, was back at Realgam Tower, during the final showdown with Ein. And even then, she didn’t really… catch up much, for whatever psychic link they got back at the temple. She still didn’t understand that, but that did happen. Maybe, if they ever got to a remote enough place, she could let him out and catch up with the rock golem. And also ask about those other temples Korriban mentioned. He said something about visiting them back then, right?
Aile’s thoughts would keep her preoccupied until she met up with her Flygon, subconsciously listening for the hum from her wings. There were times the woman could appreciate a perpetual sandstorm. Now was one of those times. She’d have Poggle this time be the one to burrow down and investigate, returning with an affirmative that the Trapinch had managed to collapse the tunnels near the pipes. With a heartfelt thanks from Aile and Tatooine(Aile’s met with mostly suspicion), the group would head out, Aile recalling Poggle and Eisley first before talking with Tatooine for a moment.
“You know they’re going to remember the former monster that helped them, right?”
“Goooon?... Tatooine thought for a moment before shaking her head. “Fly fly gon. Fwy…. fwy fly gon gon.”
“They will. You were a menace to them, and some of them had some sort of memory of that. But then you help them sort out a turf war where some of their space was taken over. Maybe because of that Garchomp as well, they could have been losing out on so much more prey. They’ll remember you.” Aile would pat her dragon between the wings, before going to rub her snout. “Now, why don’t you return. Take a rest, you need it.” Finally recalling Tatooine, Aile would find her way back to Trainer Hill as discreetly as possible, with a few more things to consider after everything was over.
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Posted: Fri Jul 25, 2025 4:35 am
Since Monique and I converted our supply run to fit the micromission, here's the thread for that. I'm late in posting this link, but it was done within the deadline.
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Posted: Fri Jul 25, 2025 12:23 pm
Excellent work by all of you! You all did splendid work and in such a timely manner, you all pass! The following rewards are distributed as follows:
Blizzard120, MoniqueBrie, Darksol88, Espeon_Commander: 1 Snag Emblem Piece, 3x Snag Coins, 2x K&L Passes OR 2x Gengar Tokens, 2x Evo Points for any applicable Pokemon used.
Blizzard120 and MoniqueBrie: Your choice of Tiny Mushroom, Pearl, Star Dust, Color Shard of Choice or 2x Snag Coins.
I took lots of notes reading your micromissions~
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