Pathetic Partiarchy

The afternoon sun was just about to disappear behind the tall trees of the Pecha Forest as Ned skittered between the twigs and dry leaves, that were covering the floor.
He still couldn't fully comprehend the situation. The Archen had asked him to go on a mission with him. But why?
It wasn't as if the Bug type could do anything the Archen wouldn't be able to achieve much more easily. But the Nincada needed the training, he needed to become stronger and the Rock type might be able to help him with that, so he decided not to complain.
At this moment the Ground type remembered, that he had forgotten to ask, what this job was actually about.
"So...what are we supposed to do here? Beat up someone? Rescue someone? Find something? Install windows? In a house I mean."

"Actually...we're taking care of an egg. A Vigoroth Father wanted us to take care of an egg while he went out and did some stuff. Something about an exploud inviting him to something I think?" the archen made his way to the area that was marked on a small description in the mission that was provided once he accepted it. The egg was hidden away so the father could leave early, and Acro had found the egg in a small den like area beneath an uprooted tree.
"There it is!" he spoke, "We have to take care of it until the Vigoroth comes back...I think all we have to do is protect it from predators that might want a omelette or something."

"I...SERIOUSLY?!"
If his neck would have been flexible enough to allow him to do so, the Nincada would now have his head hit the ground multiple times. But as that wasn't the case, an exasperated sigh would have to do.
"So we're going to have to do the work all because that Pokémon is a horrible father? I can't really call my own upbringing "good", but at least they managed to watch out that I wasn't killed themselves."
This was just terrible. On the one hand Ned couldn't allow to let this idiocy and incompetence go by unpunished, on the other hand they couldn't just leave the egg lying around.
"Urgh...this is just great. Hopefully the young one will grow up to be a better being than its father is."

"Or mother..." the archen spoke, "Although he could have just been attending a emergency and he couldn't bring the egg along right?"
The archen's thoughts were more along the line of wishful thinking. The vigoroth was dreadful father, but it was a bit better than a mother leaving her own son to die after he was pushed out of the tree by her.
"Where is the mother anyways?" he wondered, "You'd think the mother would be able to take care of the egg for a few seconds, unless she doesn't know?"
The archen felt himself begin to babble, and shut his beak and allow the nincada to respond to his rush of dialogue, even though it was not that much dialogue. The self conscious bird seemed to think that almost everything he did that was bad was excessive. He seemed to have been going a bit better lately, but the bullies within his mind still remained.

"Maybe they got divorced and now they take turns caring for the egg. Or rather the mother takse turns caring and not caring for the egg. The father doesn't seem to be doing anything at all."
Having grown up in a society, in which the entire clan watched day and night over the extremely vulnerable young, this situation felt even more wrong to the Nincada than it would have to most other Pokémon.
After this mission would be over, that Pokémon would be the recipient of a piece of the Bug type's mind for sure. But for now they had a job to take care of.
At least Ned would not be facing any problems navigating in the dark or across the treetops.
One of the few advantages being a Bug type had.

Acro remained silent to the Nincada's words, pondering them. Why DID the dad leave and why couldn't he just say the reason why? If it was an emergency then he would have stated it in the mission wouldn't he? He also wondered why this mission was so low ranked, this was the life of an unborn pokemon at risk. Sure it seemed as if nothing was even going to happen, but that did not change the fact that this pokemon had so much to live for and surely could have been guarded more carefully by a stronger team.

Kat carried out 2 launched of one Pecha Forest :

,

Acro Energy = 42

"I guess this will be 24 hours of sitting around without really doing anything then. There are more exciting missions I guess, but I don't really mind. I'm used to spending my time doing nothing. It's usually safer to just hide in or under a tree and wait."
This mission really did not seem to be much different from the Bug type's normal life. If all missions would be like this one, then he would have no problems signing up right now. But obviously there would be much more dangerous ones, missions in lands far away and missions about battling creatures several times larger than the Nincada would ever be. And probably also missions involving defeating absurd amounts of...
"BIRD!"

((Acro Energy: 39))

A Murkrow had been diving for the archen, deciding it wanted to take down competition before it was born via destroying the egg. The murkrow gave a screech as it pulled up, its surprise attack ruined by the Nincada.

Acro, not wishing to be attacked already right off the bat, began to dart about, creating copies of himself and using Double Team to create doubles. It was difficult to decipher which archen was real and which was fake, but the Murkrow only seemed to smirk. It spread its wings, a few feathers being released as they began to shine and reflect the archen's movements. As soon as the reflecting feathers witnessed the archen's moves, the Murkrow began to dart about as well, using double team as well!

Seeing the flurry of birds all around him, the Bug type began to chuckle.
This would not be as bad as expected.
A silvery powder trickled down onto the ground from behind the Nincada's stubby wings.
Even though he wasn't able to use them to fly, these things could still be useful to him.
Flapping them as rapidly as he could, a gust of wind was created, lifting the brilliant dust into the air, forming shining crescents of Bug-typed pain.
Quickly the horde of a Murkrow was enveloped in the attack, surprisded screeching to be heard from it.
Now that that problem had been taken care of, Ned hoped for his avian companion to have some sort of plan for dealing with their adversary.
His own attacks were not all that great to be used against a Flying type after all.

The silvery gust of wind pierced through the copies and struck the real murkrow, the archen quickly reacted through the form of using his Ancient Power to collect nearby rocks and scentence the Murkrow to a stoning. The murkrow screeched as the small rocks showered his body and feathers began to fly as he tried to fly away from the rocks. His only shelter was behind a tree, as he listened to rocks smack against the bark and chip off a small part of the tree along with it.

Acro was caught off guard once more as a few feathers were tossed out from behind the tree the murkrow hid behind and began to shine and reflect the move. The rocks that had gathered at the base of the tree wobbled, not being expertly controlled like the archen had the ability to after having used the move so much, before being thrown at the nincada and the archen!

It was oddly satisfying to see the Flying type be the one to be beaten up for once.
Ned had had enough of constantly being picked on by those pesky featherbrains.
Snickering he stood by, watching the spectacle of the Murkrow being pelted by the barrage of rocks.
Thus he easily missed some of these rocks behaving strangely after they had landed, only realizing, that they were headed in his direction when it was too late.
Luckily however the Bug type presented only a small target to the earthern barrage, thus being missed by most of the attack. A few stones hit their target, causing the Nincada to yelp out in pain.
"And this is why I usually remain hidden."


(What exactly is the Murkrow doing? Except for Hidden Power Murkrow can not learn any Rock type moves.)

((Mirror Move, Status Attack, Flying Type, Egg Move, The user counters the target by mimicking the target's last move))

The archen was pelted with rocks, causing him to screech in pain and retreat behind the safe bark of a tree as rocks pinged off the bark and left a small cut in the tree from where the rock had smashed into it. He held his wing over his other, examining a bruise from a rock that had struck him quite hard. He heard the nincada speak and shouted to the nincada, "Hide! This thing can copy our moves!"

The murkrow gave a gleeful caw as it danced out of its hiding spot, confident that the boulders it had just obtained power over would protect it. That was, until the boulders began to wobble and the aura around them began to fade. The boulders rained down around the murkrow as it darted about, squawking, and avoiding the rain of boulders with just barely a few bruises.

Despite the rather unfortunate situation the duo found themselves in, the Nincada could not help himself but chuckle at the Murkrow's incompetence regarding the usage of the move it had just copied.
While the Flying type was able to copy any move the duo might use, that still didn't mean it would be exactly as effective.
Just as it had happened so many times already, a powder of fine silver shine rose up into the air, shining storms of it descending unto the Dark type again. It would probably be another attack the feral Pokémon would be able to use against them, but both Ned and Acro were resistant to attacks of this type, so it shouldn't be too much of a problem.

(Ah, Egg Move. That explains it.)

The murkrow screeched as it was struck by the wind, the bug powered move clashing with its own dark energy. The crow glared at the nincada before giving an enraged caw and flying towards the nincada as fast as it could with its beak sticking out and ready to smash into the nincada unless it did something.
Acro finally peaked from around his trunk to see the murkrow charging towards the nincada, he gave a squawk of his own before his tail began to glow. He darted forward and tried to either cut off the murkrow or smash it under his tail. It would all have depended on the archen's timing and speed of the murkrow. The attack would either be too late at the murkrow would hit the nincada, unless the nincada did something to help avoid the attack, be right on time and the murkrow be would be smacked with a tail made completely of iron, or it would surprise the murkrow and its attack would halt.

Despite all of his cautiousness the Nincada had not expected the most simple option.
Instead of using Mirror Move to copy the Silver Wind, it was just charging at him.
Reacting too late, the Bug type was hit by the full force of the attack, knocked back quite a distance before crashing against a tree and landing on his back.
Ned's claws were flailing helplessly in the air as he tried to get up again somehow.
Every single nonexistent bone in his body was hurting.
This was why the Nincada generally avoided Flying types whenever possible.
Some day, some far, far away day he too would be able to soar across these skies of blue.
But that was just a dream for now.