Veiled in Shadows

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My Precious Scarf! Mission Info:

The trees started to grow larger and more frequent the further into the forest the pair of Pokémon went. With that, the canopy above became fuller with less holes, letting in less and less light. In the Pecha Forest, the sunlight was filtered through some leaves, but not enough to really darken up the place. But Shadowhue Forest? It was an entirely different beast altogether. As barely any light managed to get through the thick foliage, the ground was shrouded in shadows with some of the darker spots looking like there was nothing but complete blackness. Who knew what could be lurking in there... But the forest was deathly silent with just some very soft footsteps treading on the patchy grass, barely even audible except to the pair that was causing them.

Varda hopped along, finding it very easy to keep going forward when the ground seemed like it had some kind of road. He didn't have the best sense of direction, oh no, and while the paths and roads in this forest were clearly less traveled, some still existed as Pokémon had walked here before. Occasionally the bird would take a look at the smaller mouse-like Pokémon by his side, smiling happily as if there were no worries in that little head of his. Indeed, the Swablu wasn't afraid of the dark at all. That might have been one reason why he had agreed to help the smaller Pokémon out, as he had been to the forest before and didn't find it very scary at all! He was certain he could help...
"It's a bit dark in here, but I'm sure we will find the scarf if we keep our eyes open!"


Current Energy: 32 (42 -10 from entering. Sky Powder in use, every other Pokémon encounter costs 1 less energy)

Varda did his best, but even a light Pokémon like Joey was just proving to be too much for him. He had decided not to let go however, even if his wings were screaming in agony and his feet were shaking, barely able to keep holding onto the Pichu. The pair kept floating, leaving their attackers behind for a moment... But with his back turned, the bird could not see what was happening behind his back. A sudden sticky mess enveloped the Swablu, causing him to let out a chirp as he realized his wings now were quite neatly stapled to his sides.

And with no spread wings, there was nothing keeping the two Pokémon in the air. The rest of the fall ended up turning into a much faster one, but luckily the remaining drop wasn't very long.
"Aah!" Varda let out a gasp as he landed on the grass with a very soft thump, rolling over and squirming as he tested whatever it was that had forced their flight to be cut so short. Sticky and strong... It had to be more web, didn't it? It seemed like his body had managed to catch most of it, almost as if he was working as a shield for Joey.

Joey shouted as the string got closer, seeming the bird Pokemon didn't hear his first shot to drop him. The web had then caught the both of them. However, the majority of the web was stuck on Varda.

Joey struggled to keep himself in a position to land properly due to the web that stuck to him and Varda. "Uggh! Stupid sticky web!" he complained as he grabbed one of the Cacnea spikes from his bag. Slicing the few pieces of webs he had stuck to him. "Varda, quick!" he said as he cut some of the strands off the bird and gave the spike to it.

He then ran a couple feet towards the spider. Preparing to defend Varda from the Pokemon. He charged his energy a bit as he prepared for the Pokemon's next move.

However, just as he did so, 3 large bug Pokemon started closing in. Each one had a set of disturbingly large pincers. The previous blue beetle Pokemon, following close behind.

Varda tried to pull his feet away from the sticky mess as he attempted to actually get on his feet. Moving was rather difficult the way he was neatly wrapped up into it, unable to use his wings to push himself up. Somehow the plump bird actually managed to stand up, but he wasn't able to do much else. The Pichu – luckily – had his hands free, and luckily for both of them, he had saved the spike they had used earlier to cut through the web. They knew it would work!

"A-Alright!" The Swablu chirped as Joey cut through the strands of sticky silk, grabbing the offered thorn with his feet once it was free enough to do so. With quick swipes, he did his best to cut the web off. A lot of it still clung to his feathers in tiny pieces and most likely would make flying quite difficult, but at least he regained most of his mobility.

But while he had worked on freeing himself, the feral Pokémon had started to close in around them. Bug Pokémon of many kinds... And most of them larger than the two Guild members on their mission. The spider was closing in with the blue beetle and the three other kind of beetles with large pincers. It even seemed like the floating husk of a bug was coming after them too! It wasn't going very well, they were clearly outnumbered. Varda looked a bit worried as his little bird brain tried to come up with a good solution, but... He wasn't exactly a tactician! There was still something he had that could work on large crowds well, so the bird started to sing. The chirpy, high-pitched song was like a soft lullaby, its tempo drowsy and the tune solemn.

Joey noticed the amount of Pokemon that surrounded them clearly outnumbered them. He began to worry a bit about what would happen once they all converged on them. Varda seemed to be ahead of the game though, as he had started to sing a lullaby. However, Joey seemed to have the effects of the lullaby also affect him.

The song so calm, the Pichu fought to keep awake. He then shook his head and charged his energy up beyond what he normally uses, forcing himself to have to discharge some of the energy. This managed to keep him awake just long enough for most of the pokemon to have fallen asleep. The only ones remaining was the flying husk of a pokemon and 2 of the pinsirs...

The Ariados still seemed to be coming towards them as it was a bit away from the song to affect it. The blue beetle Pokemon seemed to have collapsed right in front of the two as the others slowly started to fall asleep also once they got in range.

Varda continued his song until he felt like he could finish, opening his eyes that had closed themselves during his concentration. It seemed like his ability to sing and put others to sleep had worked, many of the Pokémon that had tried to attack them now peacefully slumbering on the ground. It seemed like even more Pokémon had gathered in the area than he remembered, able to see some kind of a small and round mushroom-like – maybe? - Pokémon snoring peacefully on the ground next to the others. Or perhaps it was just a victim of the song, an innocent bystander. He didn't know, but luckily sleeping didn't hurt anyone... Right?

Snapping out of his thoughts, the bird remembered that they had to act. The spider had seemed to manage to stay awake, as had two of the pincer bugs that did currently seem awfully drowsy and the floating husk that kept approaching them in its slow but steady manner. If they didn't act fast, they would be surrounded once more!

The Swablu flapped his wings, feeling bits and pieces of the web still clinging to his feathers, but he managed to gain enough air to move faster than he did when on foot – his tiny little short feet weren't all that great at running, after all. The identical brown bug Pokémon were the closest, so Varda rushed at one of them with his beak to peck them as an attempt to at least get them to back off.

The Ariados seemed the pick up its pace as it noticed a real fight breaking out. Disappearing into the shadows, the relentless predator went after the target it thought was easy due to it being alone: the small Pichu. Coming out of the shadows once close enough, the spider lunged at the mouse Pokémon to grab it.

Joey turned towards the the giant spider as he let out a slight gasp as he quickly shot several bolts of energy at it. A few of the bolts hit the spider. However the spider still seemed determined to grab the little pokemon. "BACK OFF!" he shouted as he continued to strike the pokemon with a frightening amount of energy as it seemingly didn't affect the pokemon to a large degree.. However, the more he used his attack, the more tired he grew. Joey was depleting his energy faster then he could charge it back up at this point.

One last bolt and the pichu could no longer launch the energy towards the pokemon... The pokemon seemed to get the hint as it started approaching the little guy. "Va-varda!" he said as he fell to the ground from exhaustion.

Varda dealt with the bug Pokémon to the best of his abilities. Currently even two on one wasn't that difficult, as his song had luckily been heard by these two and they were clearly fighting the urge to fall asleep like the rest of their attackers, their movements sluggish as they tried to push away their drowsiness. Before they managed to do that was the best time to try to attack them – after all, the little bird really didn't want to get caught on the horn-like protrusions these large beetles had! The pincers certainly seemed like they had enough power to squeeze something as small as him rather painfully.

And in a forest filled with bugs, a bird like him had the type advantage – even though he couldn't really fly very well with all the web still clinging to him. He managed to down one of the brown beetles before he heard the Pichu call his name, almost completely having forgotten about his friend in the middle of other very distracting thoughts! He stopped to float in place as he glanced in Joey's direction, noticing his friend's plight... And of course immediately getting struck by the other bug from behind while he was distracted.

Crashing to the ground, the Swablu fought to see past the stars that were currently clouding his vision, his head feeling all strange. But he no longer was that weak Pokémon he used to be back when he first joined the Guild. He had gone through worse and been able to stand, his mere determination allowing Varda to shake off his dizziness as he forced himself on his feet. Running to the spider, he immediately got to distracting it so he could buy Joey some time.
"Try to get away!" He chirped to his friend as he hopped on top of the large spider Pokémon.

Joey watched as Varda jumped onto the spider as he chirped for Joey to try to get away. "What about you!" he said as he started running away from the spider. However, he was having trouble keeping pace due to his lack of energy.

I... over did it. he thought as he breathed heavily as he continued to attempt to run away. The spider becoming annoyed with the bird, had attempted to throw it off. If it managed to, it would shoot webs at it to make the bird unable to move.

"I dunno!" Varda chirped, awfully chipper despite the situation at hand. He never was one to plan very far – or plan in general – so he wasn't entirely sure what was going to happen to him. Perhaps he could outrun the other bugs once he had bought Joey enough time. Right now getting the Pichu away was his main concern, as the little Pokémon seemed to have grown tired of everything that had happened today already. He couldn't blame him, their day had been long... And they had yet to even find the mission item!
"I'll come up with something!" He tried to reassure Joey so that he wouldn't actually stick around out of worry.

The Swablu was slightly faster than the spider-like Pokémon, and he also had another thing that was an advantage in the current situation: his size. He was smaller and thus a more difficult target to hit – but he was also light and easily shook off. He could feel the spider trying to throw him off, so he instead jumped off himself and landed right next to the aggressive Pokémon, running underneath its belly. A surprisingly safe place until the spider decided to try to stomp on him! Varda quickly retreated and changed his hiding spot, never staying in one place for too long. He wasn't even trying to attack, concentrating only on evading all the attacks and keeping the feral Pokémon busy for a while. The constant movement was starting to stretch some of the sticky threads of silk still clinging to him, little by little giving him more mobility...

The Shedinja didn't do well in such chaotic situations. Instead, as it saw the Pichu getting away, it started to float after the little Pokémon, sticking to the shadows.

Joey growing even more tired as he continued to to make his escape from the spider pokemon. Just couldn't quite take the exhaustion for much longer. He needed to rest badly... Just as he got a decent amount of space between the spider and him. He fell down to the ground.

The Shedninja that had been following close behind noticed this and took it as an excellent chance to knock the pichu out completely. Since it's target was not going to be able to run away for much longer. It decided to start charging up for a solar beam attack. The circlet floating above it started to glow brightly as it charged.

~~~~~~~

The pichu turned around as he saw a flicker of light just as the attack was almost finished charging.

((Make a note of any pokemon that are completely gone... Sleeping ones I would like to remain on encounter list for now...))

Varda felt how his wings were able to stretch more again, the pieces of web clinging to his feathers loosening up. It was a good thing of course, but he would need to remove it all himself later on when he had the chance. Right now the bird baited the spider to attack, dodging and moving out of the way to the best of his ability. The web the feral Pokémon was able to shoot was the most dangerous thing the Swablu knew of, so that kind of an attack was what he avoided the most! Occasionally some other attacks would hit him, scratching and nicking him, but Varda wasn't giving up or slowing down. He didn't have the choice!

The brown beetles that hadn't quite managed to fall asleep staggered forward after the little bird that had left them alone after dashing to the spider-like Pokémon. It seemed like they hadn't quite quit the battle yet either, though one of them seemed more battered than the other due to having been attacked. In their sluggish state, they luckily were easy for the Swablu to notice before it was too late, spreading his wings and using them to gain extra height as he jumped into the air. And that was when the luck was on his side. The beetles ended up attacking the spider instead, enraging it and causing it to attack the other bug Pokémon! It didn't stop there. The feral Pokémon seemed like they didn't take very kindly to being attacked, now turning up against each other and forgetting about the bird... For now, at least.

It was the moment Varda needed to make his escape. Trying to think of the direction where Joey had ended up running, he took off and started to fly, looking around for the little Pichu – who was, by now, hopefully safe. But what he ended up noticing was the strange floating Pokémon he had tripped up on earlier, glowing in the darkness... And before it, Joey! The surprise of seeing that forced the Swablu to stop for a moment, wasting precious time before he was able to react. Charging at the husk of a bug as fast as he could with his beak first, he hoped he could push it away before something bad happened...



((The Heracross, Shroomish and one of the Pinsir is sleeping. The rest are either occupied by something else (and potentially knocked out by other Pokémon) or that Shedinja jerk...))

Joey gasped as the energy seemed to come at him in slow motion. Varda striking the pokemon after the attack had been already unleashed. He felt genuinely afraid of something once again. The beam of light seemed frozen in time as his thoughts raced through his head. I... I don't want it to end this way... he thought as the light came closer and closer to him. He began to close his eyes as his cheeks started to spark with energy... He took as much power as he possibly could and shot it towards the beam just as it came towards him... Seemingly taking forever to him as his life seemed to have slowed down.

However, electricity is not something that can stop the power of the sun... Maybe weaken it but there is no way to stop it... Eventually the light enveloped the pichu and the electrical explosion that followed from his previous last ditch effort to stop the beam, left smoke all around the area in between the pichu and the other two pokemon.

Any remaining pokemon in the area seemed to have stopped fighting and stared at the scene. The pichu seeming to be on the ground. The tiny mouse pokemon was still alive, but completely motionless.

Varda felt his attack connect, the bug Pokémon was forced to back off from the power of the impact – and the peck with its type advantage broke the floating husk's guard, knocking it out in the process. But he had been too late. The attack it had charge managed to fire off, having done so before the bird had managed to knock down the attacker. It hadn't made the beam of light even go slightly off-course! An explosion occurred with sparks flying everywhere, the area enveloped in a flash of blind light. Another Paras that had been nearby quickly scurried away, afraid of the sudden light in its dark forest home.

Smoke appeared everywhere, but it was quickly cleared. The Swablu coughed, flapping his wings as he tried to get rid of the thick cloud that obscured his vision. It seemed like everyone that had been a part of the fight had woken up by now, but no one did anything. Everyone just... Stared, perhaps unable to understand what exactly had happened. But Varda quickly hopped back to the Pichu when he finally managed to see the little yellow body in the middle of the grass.

"Joey? Joey!" He tried to call out, gently nudging the Pokémon in question with his wings. It didn't look good, Joey wasn't moving at all... And if the other Pokémon around them decided to attack again, they would be in an even bigger mess! Not wasting any time, the bird Pokémon inched his wings under the little mouse, using them to gently roll the Pichu on top of him. They both were small and light Pokémon, yet to the weaker and lighter bird, Joey was actually quite heavy... But with all of the weight dispersed as evenly as possible and carried by his legs, he could hopefully do this. His wings stabilized the Pokémon on top of his head as he suddenly started to dash in a random direction as fast as his little bird feet took him with the extra weight, running away from the feral Pokémon that might want to eat them.


((You're free to make them settle down and rest somewhere if you'd rather wake up in a spot like that.))

Joey heard the voice call out to him, however he couldn't move at all or make a sound. It was as if he was in a shell of himself. Varda... Don't give up... he said to himself in thought. He then felt something pick him up and carry him. He attempted to see who it was as he attempted to open his eyes, but to no avail.

The other pokemon in the area seemed to have stopped all fighting after witnessing the incident... The only ones that resumed fighting were the pinsirs. However, all the other pokemon seemed to have lost the will to fight. They eventually forced any of the remaining pinsirs out of the area after the bird pokemon departed with the pichu.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Some point after Varda had traveled some ways away from the horde of pokemon they had encountered. Varda must of found some spot to rest. The pichu opened his eyes as remained where he was. Still unable to move completely. "Varda??" he said slowly. Hoping that he was still with his partner.

((Defense scarf silently added... If you like the item instead. Please make note and I will remove from my records.))

Varda ran with the smaller Pokémon in tow, rushing through the dark grass and hopping over the twisting roots of the large trees that blocked most of the sun. He didn't stop to take a look behind him, he couldn't check if they were being followed in case they actually were being followed. He was just going to act like they were and run as fast as he could to leave those chasing them behind! A Swablu wasn't really made for running – or carrying – but somehow the little Pokémon managed to leave the feral Pokémon behind... Probably because they actually weren't chasing them.

Winded, the bird gasped for air once he came to another clearing, his legs finally forcing him to stop as they no longer could keep going. Varda coughed and let the Pichu slide off him gently, letting the mouse-like Pokémon rest on the soft grass. He needed to rest too, soon plopping down on his feathery posterior and even rolling onto his back, his wings spread on the grass and his feet in the air. The Swablu took in some air, breathing heavily as he tried to catch his breath. It was nice to just relax...

He could have fallen asleep too if the silence wasn't suddenly broken by Joey's voice. He had almost forgotten about the other Pokémon, which was quite odd – after all, he wouldn't really have ran like that if he hadn't been carrying the Pichu to safety, would he? The blue bird tilted his face to the side just enough to see Joey, a smile on his face.
"Heere," Varda's voice sounded a bit lazy and drawn out, almost as if he was yawning,
"You're awake... That's good."

Bird carried out 10 launched of one Shadowhue Forest :

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