Pilot's Dare

{Energy: 25 - 16 (entry) = 9}

Heheh...he couldn't wait to one-up Pilot again. Ever since Hidon had actually managed to shut that bird brain up back in the Pecha Forest by actually somehow managing to beat him in their rematch, he couldn't stop thinking about it! Of course, he had some assistance in that endeavor. He cast a quick glance behind him at the Taillow, who was following him to make sure he actually went where he was supposed to. he was a little bit harder to make out with that lighter-color plumage, but what did he care? Those pink feathers were such a hilarious memento of his glorious, well-deserved victory!

That memory was the brightest thing he had as he made his way across the Grima Outpost to the ruins located just ont he opposite side. They were almost there at this point. He couldn't believe how simple this would be. Fed up with his constant taunts and laughter at the Taillow's new coloration, compliments of their little wager back in that forest, the bird brain had actually come up with a way to try to get back at him. The Taillow had probably thought that Hidon would be too chicken to accept the dare he'd been given, but what was so bad about this place? Sure it was where all that whole darkness thing had supposedly originated and it was supposed to be cursed, but what did he care? All he had to do was go in, look around for a while, find something there to take home and leave. How hard could that be?

Of course, his confidence shook slightly when the building actually lay in front of him, the front door practically begging him to enter as though trying to tempt him into some kind of trap.

"W-wow, okay, this place looks a lot creepier up close..." he murmured, probably just loud enough for Pilot to hear if he was close enough.

[Energy: 39 - 16 (Entrance Cost) = 23]
[Exclusive Item: White Silk (Reduces cost of every other Pokemon rolled by 1)]

"Oh, it's 'no big deal'? I'm pretty sure that whatever made the door disappear isn't just going to let us out," Pilot told Hidon with an amused grin. Seeing his partner in such disarray made him quite satisfied; he was getting much-needed payback for the bet. "At least, not until they're done screwing with us. Or maybe we'll be trapped in here forever..." He continued, putting particular emphasis on the word "forever". He could tell that the Charmander was trying his best to avoid thinking about such a gruesome possibility, and he was taking full advantage of it.

"...Wait," Pilot whispered, suddenly stopping in his tracks. He pressed his ear against the door Hidon was about to open, so as to listen to what was going on inside the room. "I think I hear something in there..." He told his partner. He wore a perfect poker face, making it extremely difficult to tell whether or not he was lying.

After being humiliated by his partner in their pre-mission sparring match, Pilot was absolutely crushed. It was quite clear, through his forlorn expression, his dejected posture, and most importantly, his brightly-colored feathers. As per their bet, the bird's once-navy plumage had been dyed an embarrassingly flamboyant pink, effectively turning him into a walking circus. Every passerby would give him an amused grin, as if he were some kind of entertainment. He hated it. And it didn't help knowing that the whole thing could have been avoided had he never made the stupid bet in the first place.

But how could he have predicted that he would lose that match? Even after his failure, Pilot was certain that he was stronger than Hidon. After all, up until the very end, he was dominating! And then somehow, his seemingly assured victory was ruined by a single, well-placed punch to the head. That was just a lucky shot... The Taillow scoffed.

He already had a plan to exact his revenge, however. It was simply, really: find something that Hidon is afraid of, and then abuse that knowledge. Ghosts were a relatively common fear among many Pokemon, so he decided to start by daring his lizard partner to go inside of the "Ruined Chateau", which was well-known for housing a variety of frightening Pokemon. Perhaps if this turned out of be a fear of Hidon's, he'd be able to reclaim some of his humility...

When they came up to the mansion, Pilot had to admit that it seemed rather ominous. He was happy to hear that his fat friend felt the same way. "Having second thoughts, Hotshot?" He asked, cackling. "It's alright if you want to turn back now... You wouldn't last five minutes in there, anyways..." He told the Charmander with a shrewd smirk.

"S-Second thoughts?" Hidon replied after a slight jump due to Pilot's sudden interjection into the thoughts he had just unintentionally spoken aloud. He could hear the bird Pokémon's cackling and growled at him. "Not on your life! I'm fine! How tough could this be?" He then turned back to look at the large mansion in front of him. "I-I mean...it' s just a huge mansion...that's been long-since abandoned. Supposedly full of ghosts and stuff. And that's said to be cursed and..." he trailed off there, sounding noticeably less and less confident as he went on. But when he looked back at the Taillow's face, including that stupid smirk plastered all over his beak, he quickly shook his head. "N-no way, I'm not backing down! C'mon, let's get in there already!"

Then, without waiting further, he stomped forward in a huff, refusing to give Pilot the pleasure of witnessing him chicken out. "In fact," he decided to add. "I'll show you just how NOT worried I am about this place!" He then reached his leg back before swinging it forward. His foot collided with the closed entryway and the door was forced open. This Charmander had just kicked open the front door to the Ruined Chateau! But he didn't stop there. "Alright, anything in here want to come at me, then come at me!" he called into the abandoned building as loudly as he could. "I can take on anything you can throw at me! So bring it on!"

He finally took his first steps into the mansion, finding himself in a rather large foyer area. He had to admit, if it weren't so old and decrepit, the place might actually look pretty nice. There was an old, rotted table in the center of the room and various furniture lining the walls, most of which either destroyed or fallen over; some were both. there were stairs on the left and right side of the room that went up and around the walls, meeting at a landing for the second floor above. But on the first floor, there was a door to the left, a door to the right and a larger, double door beneath the staircase.

"...See?" He said, confidence returning little by little. "This isn't so bad. I mean, look, the door hasn't even snapped shut on us or anything. And that's what every creepy place is supposed to do!"

Pilot grinned, secretly a bit relieved that the door hadn't slammed shut on them as soon as they went inside. While he did want to see Hidon freak out, it definitely wasn't worth getting trapped inside! The place was a bit too spooky for his taste. After all, if he freaked out too, it would pretty much defeat the purpose of coming in the first place. Anticipating some kind of jumpscare, the bird looked back to make sure that there was still an escape route. However, when he turned around, he did not see what he had expected...

"Uh, Hidon...? The door is... Gone. It was riiiiight there. Or is it just me?" The bird questioned, prodding at his partner's shoulder and pointing at a solid wall. For a few moments, he stared at it, trying to sort out what had just happened. How could it just disappear like that? Less than a minute ago, they had walked through the entrance, and now it seemed as if there had never been an entrance in that spot! "You just had to say that, didn't you? You'd better shut up before something else happens!" He shouted, seeming a bit panicked. Wait, I don't think ghost Pokemon can even hit me! He suddenly realized. And with that thought, all of his worries had vanished. If they really were trapped, he'd be relatively safe... Of course, his partner wouldn't be so lucky.

"Gone?" Hidon repeated, initially turning around to look at his companion again. "What d'you mean gone? I knew you were a bird brain, but how could a door...?" He stopped himself when he looked past Pilot at the empty wall that they had initially come through. There was no way he was making a mistake on which wall that was. It was on the opposite side of the double doors, which had been directly in front of them when they came in. He could hardly believe his eyes. "Wh-what in the...?" he murmured, approaching the wall just as Pilot began to shout at him. He growled slightly in retaliation to the Taillow's words and shot him a glare before patting the wall where the door had been.

It seemed just as solid as any other wall, and there didn't seem to be anywhere for a switch or something to be hidden. Nothing about this wall seemed fake...so what in the world had happened? Were the rumors true? He had heard something about Pokémon getting lost in here, but he hadn't given any credence to them, deeming them too stupid to believe. So then...were ghost Pokémon really going to be a problem here? Were they being watched right now...? A shiver ran down his spine at the idea of something they couldn't see just staring at them while they struggled to find the door.

"L-look, j-just shut up, bird brain!" Hidon growled, sounding slightly panicked himself. He noticed that Pilot was starting to relax again. Of course he'd be okay, Ghost types wouldn't be a problem for a Normal type like him...and better yet, his Brave Bird would still be just as effective as it was on anyone else. He would be at a great advantage. But he was going to have a tough time with them himself. Great.... So now he was at a disadvantage compared to Pilot in this situation. Pilot's revenge scheme, whatever it truly was, would probably be a lot easier to pull off for him now.

"W-well whatever. There's gotta be another way out of here somewhere else." he muttered, turning to look at the three other doors. "Like...a back door or something. N-no big deal." He looked at the three doors, trying to figure out which one they should take. Well...he supposed that there was no better place to start than on the left and work his way to the right. He nodded to himself and started toward the door.

Hopefully, Pilot wouldn't make this worse than it already was for him...but he knew that the Taillow wasn't going to just let him off the hook while he had such an advantage.

"Sh-shut up, bird brain!" Hidon snapped back a the Taillow as the Tiny Swallow Pokémon continued to tease him about the house. Worst of all was that stupid grin on his face. He could tell that Pilot was merely playing up the drama in an attempt to scare him...or at least unsettle him more than he already was. The worst part, however, was that the bird Pokémon was succeeding. He desperately tried to cover it up as best as he could, but to no avail. It was clear as day that Pilot was witnessing every second of it. "I-I don't know what's up with that stupid door, b-but there's always more than one way out. A-and it's not like the door could just disappear."

His claws laid themselves upon the door, ready to push it open when Pilot suddenly whispered out of nowhere. He watched as Pilot pressed himself up against the door and claimed to hear something. "Oh screw you, I-I'm not falling for that." Hidon muttered. "You're just trying to scare me. So get back before I make you." With that, he pushed his way past Pilot and finally pushed open the door, leading him into the next room.

Digizel carried out 9 launched of one Ruined Chateau :

, , , , , , , ,

{Energy: 9 - a lot = 0}

Hidon pushed the door open to reveal...! A...closet? Hidon took a step inside the closet and took a quick look around, scanning the contents as quickly as he could. Well, at least it was small and rather empty. That meant that Pilot's threat was just that: a threat. He hadn't actually heard a darn thing! But his thoughts were soon distracted when he realized that this room wasn't completely empty. sitting up on a shelf above their heads was a blue orb. But before he could say anything or even make a motion toward it, Pilot was already swooping into the air and snatching it off of the shelf. He wouldn't have cared that much...had the bird brain not swooped back down to the ground, declared it his property, and stuck his tongue out at him.

"Y-you little...!" Hidon growled, but the swallow Pokémon immediately began talking over him, causing him to lose is train of thought. And the bird's words forced his thoughts to go back to the topic at hand: the ghosts that were apparently haunting this stupid building. "Sh-shut up Pilot," Hidon grumbled, trying to shove the bird aside as he moved past him and returned to the foyer, though is unease would be quite easy for Pilot to pick up on. "You're not scaring me. Nothing was hiding in there and you know it. So stop trying, 'cause it won't work." Of course...he could only hope that he was right. If it turned out that Pilot was actually telling the truth and something HAD been in there...well, he wasn't really sure what he would do.

Whatever the case, he couldn't let Pilot get the better of him. No matter what happened, he had to stand his ground. And he absolutely could not EVER ask that bird brain for help. He began walking toward the door on the opposite wall, the only other single door in the building. after he checked this one, he could figure out where he wanted to go next.

Just as Hidon was reaching that opposite door, a loud crash, a squawk of pain that he sometimes wished that he would get to hear more often, followed by thud as something crumpled to the floor. He quickly turned around to see exactly what he had expected to see: His bird-brain partner had apparently somehow ended up on the floor, but was already getting back up and scanning the room. 'I swear, if he tries to blame me for that, I'm gonna...' he muttered in his mind. Thankfully, that didn't seem to be the case. He moved to turn back toward the door in front of him, but stopped again when Pilot suddenly yelled across the room this time. The sudden shouting almost made him jump!

"Th-the heck are you talking about!?" he growled, agitation growing slightly as he spun around and looked at where his partner was pointing. But, of course...there was absolutely nothing there. "There's nothing there Bird Brain." he muttered. At that moment, though, something crossed his mind and Pilot's actions all suddenly made more sense. He rolled his eyes at the Taillow and put a claw to his waist. "C'mon, Bird Brain, how dumb do you think I am?" he growled. "All you did was pretend to get knocked over and then point at a 'ghost' that you 'saw.' All you're trying to do is freak me out. I told you to knock it off, 'cause it's NOT. WORKING."

Hidon made sure to put plenty of stress on those last two words, hoping it would sink into his bird-brained teammate's mind...and trying to stubbornly deny the fact that the Taillow's words just might be getting to him after all. He was sick of these little jokes.... He turned back toward the door before him and reached up, grabbing hold of the handle. "Now just shut up and come on. We've got an exit to find," he muttered before twisting the handle and swinging the door open.