Fearful Flaffy

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Mission Details:

(14 energy)

Leif had been on three missions with Sova before this. This was the first one that Sove picked himself, rather than Leif picking, or picking as a team. However, being in a forest, Leif was glad to have his partner pick somewhere... less wet than last time. Cattail forest was a nightmare for Leif, and he was grateful to be anywhere other than that accursed marsh. Even if it was a rather dark forest. Anything was better than that miserable place.

He couldn't help that he had been here before. In fact, he had twice, but retained no recollection. Such was the pleasure of amnesia. Leif decided to not say anything about feeling he had been here as to not make Sova feel guilty again for Leif's amnesia. It wasn't Sova's fault, but Leif knew Sova blamed himself and tried to avoid putting that on his partner,

"Little? Come on, you're not that big either." Sova said before tackling the Paras. Getting into melee range allowed it to scratch at him, but his tackle knocked it away before much damage could be done. Just as he went in for another tackle, planning on finishing the fight quickly, he felt a wind blow in his direction, carrying silver glowing scales. It felt like small pieces of glass cutting him, he couldn't help but cover his face with a paw out of reflex, before stumbling out of the way of the attack. He was now covered in very small, burning cuts, but it was nothing that would worry him.

He spotted the source of the attack, a Venomoth, probably in some way allied with the Paras. Or perhaps he was just assuming that because they were both attacking him and they both happened to be bug types. The Venomoth then began vibrating its wings, creating a very loud buzzing sound, bringing hurting Sova's ears. He wanted to just fall down and cover his ears, but knew that wouldn't make the enemies go away or help him show he could take care of himself.

"Well, I wanted to save this for a special occasion....but I guess this is good enough." He said as he reached his head into his item bag and pulled out a Swift Seed, eating it. Immediately, his speed drastically increased. The Paras sprayed a cloud of stun spores at him, but with his increased speed, he dodged it easily by simply running out of the way. He darted forward, ignoring the pain in his ears, tackling the Paras into a nearby tree. He then shifted his view to above, how would he be able to get to the Venomoth? He'd certainly need to hurry and figure that out before the swift seed wore off.

Sova took a moment to think, then ran over to a tree with some low hanging branches, it looked like the branches would bend too. He leaped up and bit onto a branch, pulling it down onto the ground and bending it back until he couldn't pull it any more, then ran forward with the branch pulling him forward, jumped, and finally released from the branch as it flung forward, sending him into the air and right into the Venomoth, knocking it out of the sky. He landed right on top of it as it hit the ground, ensuring it fainted.

"Huh. Now this is unexpected. All the better. Let's see whether you can really take care of yourself."
Quite a coincidence this was indeed. Approached had a foe that was powerful enough to accurately assess the Eevee's fighting prowess and yet its typing was one the Gengar was highly resistant to, allowing for him to easily intervene should things start to look bleak for the Normal type.
For now still trying not to change the outcome of the battle, the Gengar calmly floated over the other Pokémon, his piercing red eyes fixated on the Eevee.

As Sova stood on the downed moth, he began to feel a piercing headache, causing him to stumble back off of the enemy onto the ground. "Ahg, my head!" He yelled as the moth flapped its wings, lifting it back into the air. Completely ignoring the pain in his head, he leaped up to the enemy and bit onto its wing, dragging it back down.

As it hit the ground again, the piercing headache faded, relieving him of the pain. As the enemy flapped its wings and lifted its self up again, it looked at him, and for some reason he felt odd. He ran forward for a tackle, but simply bumped into the moth, unable to tackle it. He quickly realized he had been disabled and backed away.

The bug attempted another Silver Wind, but Sova detected and avoided the painful wind. Acting quickly before his quick seed wore off, he darted forward and skidded to a stop in front of the enemy, knocking sand up in its face . As it tried to fly off, he bit onto its wing again, dragging it back down onto the ground. He then lifted his front paws into the air and slammed them down on the venomoth's chest, knocking it out.

He stood silent for a moment, panting, wanting to fall over and rest. "S-see? Eas....easy...." He stuttered between breaths.

Slowly the Gengar descended to the ground again, clapping.
"Not bad, Eevee. I have to say you surpassed my expectations.  Still you might want to get a little more practice. It doesn't seem as if you would be able to defeat another assailant in your current state."
While it may seem as if it was the case, the Gengar was not trying to be annoying or insulting. He simply didn't want for someone to feel unneccessary pain. And feeling the need to prove oneself could easily lead to overestimating oneself, which in turn would lead to biting off more than one could chew.
The Eevee had impressed him thus far, but he still wasn't fully convinced.
Would the Normal type ever be able to earn his respect?

Sova simply sat down and began laughing. "My current state? I have Oran berries with me." He said with a smile. Though it may have seemed that he was laughing at the gengar's assumption that he wouldn't be able to handle more fighting, he was actually just happy. This particular fight had been very fun for him, he finally got to use the quick seed he was saving, and he even got an applause from the gengar to whom he had been striving to prove himself.

The only thing that could make the moment better would be finding the Flaaffy, which he scanned the area for. Still no sight of it.

"Now, you have proven that you are capable of fighting. Somewhat at least. The time has come for us to see whether you are capable of scouting as well. If I am not mistaken you still have a mission to undertake, do you not?"
It may occassionally appear to be the case, but fighting was neither magic nor the only thing that was of major importance to the abilities of an explorer. After all defeating an entire forest worth of enemies would not be worth anything if one would not be capable of rescuing the mission target as well.
So now it remained to be seen - would Sova be capable of finding the Electric type in this deep darkness and if yes, then how?

Sova stood up and sighed. "Well, if I had Leif here it'd be easy to teleport and scout above. You could also float up and scout, but it'd make all of this pointless if I relied on you." He said as he scanned the area. Obviously he wasn't going to be seeing anything, so he thought of another course of action.

He stood for a moment with his eyes closed, moving his head as if he was still looking around, then opened his eyes and began walking off the path in a direction. "Alright, this way."

Silently the Gengar chuckled. He would not have minded at all if the Eevee would have asked him to scout instead. After all it is a very important quality not to be too proud but rather being willing to accept the assistance of others.  But the Normal type had now made a...somewhat random descision and he was hoping to prove himself, so the Ghost type was going to go along with that.
"Very well. Let's see whether you have chosen the correct path."
With these words the Gengar levitated a bit higher again, following the Eevee through the darkness of the Shadowhue Forest.

What the gengar probably didn't realize was with Sova's canine form and....fairly large ears came above average hearing, allowing him to pick out the faint sounds of panicked murmuring nearby.  "Aand here she is."  He said as he leaped over a bush into a bit of a clearing.  Sure enough, there was a Flaaffy, murmuring to her self in a panic.

The Flaaffy jumped back at the sight of Sova.  "P-please don't hurt me!" She said, to which the eevee replied "Don't worry, we're here to rescue you."  He gave a reassuring smile, calming the panicked Flaaffy down.

He then turned to William.  "If you're wondering, I could hear her."

"Huh, guess those ears of yours have another function than just to make you stand out in the tall grass.", the Gengar admitted. Facing the Flaafy he continued:
"Yeah, he's on a mission to get you out of here and I'm with him. For now at least."
The Gengar wasn't really that adept at social interaction so he decided to leave the talky stuff to the Normal type. It was he who wanted to prove himself after all. This would be an interesting situation. Calming down a frightened Pokémon while accompanied by a Gengar was no easy task for sure. So the Eevee would have to be pretty good to succeed here.

All was well until the Flaaffy took her attention off of Sova and looked at the gengar. "Wh-who's he?" She said, nervously.

"His name's William. He's a jerk, but he's harmless." Sova paused, looking at the gengar and back to the flaaffy. "And I'm Sova."

The flaaffy smiled at William's expense, but said nothing on the topic, not even her own name. "So....you know the way out, right?" The flaaffy asked.

"Yup, most of it is actually a straight shot and it's not too far. I guess we got lucky, huh?" Sova said, before turning around and heading back the way they came. "C'mon then." He continued. The flaaffy began following close behind.

The Gengar found himself chuckling.
Considering his history "jerk" was one of the most polite things he had ever heard himself described as.
Luckily that had changed lately, but the wounds from past times still hurt of course.
Now, while the Flaafy still seemed to be scared, the Gengar couldn't really hold it against her. She had been alone in a dangerous forest up to now after all. How did she get this far in anyway?
In any case - focussing on the job at hand: Sova seemed to have managed to calm the Electric type down. Somewhat at least. So now they might be able to find their way out of this place again. How well would the Eevee fare at escorting the Flaafy out of this place? He still hadn't fulfilled the mission requirements after all.

Sova kept leading, finding the way back to the path easily and turning to backtrack along it with the other two following. The way out was mostly a straight shot, he didn't expect for there to be any more problems. Then he remembered something from earlier. "Oh! William, do you know an archeops named Acro?" He said, expecting the answer to be yes. He'd been meaning to ask that for a while, but circumstances made idle chatter difficult.

Silently the Gengar folllwed the other two Pokémon in whichever direction the Eevee was leading them.
"Acro? Oh, yeah. I've known him since I was just a Gastly. We're quite good friends actually. Wait...did you say Archeops? Either you and I are talking about different Pokémon or...heh, so he evolved. Guess I've got to send him a fruit basket or something now."
This was thoroughly unexpected. Of course the Gengar hadn't met with the ex-Archen for quite some time now, but for him to have evolved and most likely mastered flight was something he had not forseen.
Now had the evolution also allowed for him to overcome those crippling insecurities of his?
The two certainly needed to meet up again some time.

(Blue is going to kill you for spoiling the surprise for William.)

"You....didn't know?" Sova said, a bit confused. How could they call each other friends if they barely even saw each other? "Anyways....he's the one I went to the Fiery Chasm with. He's nice." He continued. They were already nearing the exit, knowing the way back and having no distractions it was quite a bit faster than on the way in. Hopefully they could finish the talk about Acro before they reached the exit, since they would probably part ways then.