Hunting for Berries

Aaron cautiously stood at the edge of the forest glancing up at the giant trees in front of him. He was right, it wasn't too dark during the day but they still cast a decent shadow over the land. Maybe this wasn't such a good idea after all, but then again he'd never get those berries by sitting out on the side lines all day. Taking a deep breath he strolled into the forest and looked around but couldn't see any berry trees.

“Where do you think we'll find some berries Whimsy?” He asked. Aaron wasn't particularly accustomed to hunting for food other than iron ore and there wouldn't be much of that around in the forest even if he dug for it. “I guess maybe we should try a little further in?”

He squinted his eyes and stood on his tiptoes as he scanned around for berries. "I guess we'll have to. How hard can it be?" Whimsy chortled. The Wooper had already begun poking at trees and waddling about, just carefully inching his way deeper. "Hang on, though. We won't find any lemons in here! Are you sure that's okay? I think pecha berries are the really sweet ones..." He trailed off, taking a look at an un-developed pecha blossom. This part of the forrest was oddly...solemn. No other Pokemon to be seen besides the two. This was a sure sign that all the good sources of food were deeper in. Where there was food, there was something to eat it.

"That's ok, I don't know where we'd find any lemons anyway. I can make do with whatever we find, and who knows maybe we'll find some Oran Berries, I think some of them grow here too and they're not as sweet.

Following Whimsy further into the forest Aaron began to forget about the dangers of the forest and instead focused purely on scouting for berries. There didn't seem to be too many feral pokemon about anyway so far the pair were entirely alone out here. Before long Aaron's fears had all but faded away and he picked up the pace a little to draw level with his friend.

"You know...it's almost scary how lonely it is out here," Whimsy said, hints of nervousness trailing blatantly. "I kinda expected to be bombarded." He stopped and listened, ear veins twitching to try and tune. Dead silence. There were better filled trees, but none of them bearing fruit. All buds, since the light hardly reached them. Whimsy pulled down a branch, taking a bite of a bud. Bitter! Blegh! He spat it out in disgust, tongue flopped out like a lazy Lickitung. "What do you think, Aaron?" He squeaked.

Aaron wasn't sure whether the quiet was eerie or reassuring. On one hand the quiet meant they were alone and that meant that there were no dangerous pokemon attacking them but on the other hand it meant that everyone else must be avoiding this area for some reason. Aaron tried not to dwell on the matter too much and instead decided to focus on the task at hand.

The young Aron couldn't help but laugh at Whimsy's lolling tongue but once he tried the blossom he soon understood why. It wasn't just bitter, he could have dealt with bitter, it was the texture, it reminded him of something... something familiar and leafy... cabbage "Blagh! So that's why everyone waits for the fruit to bloom first. "That's horrible!" Aaron blurted out in disgust as he opened and closed his mouth in an attempt to rid himself of the remaining leaves. "Let's keep looking for berries, there's got to be one or two around here somewhere." Aaron kept walking further into the forest, "Maybe there's a clearing or something with some berries in it."

Whimsy chuckled at his reaction and waddled after Aaron. "Look on the bright side! If there's berries, it'll be brighter there, right?" He chimed reassuringly, gawking at his surroundings. Even the eery quiet left enough time to get a look at the place. It was wonderfully leafy, breezy, and not to moist nor dry. It reminded Whimsy of the land surrounding his home Peanut Swamp. Every so often, he stopped to splash in little puddles, or try to eat plants he thought might be passable. Of course, after the first stomach ache, he learned that the latter was a horrible idea. Whimsy should perhaps leave the snacking for when they found what was certainly edible.

Plodding along beside Whimsy Aaron too took the opportunity to play in a few of the puddles, oblivious to how much noise the pair were making in the otherwise quiet woodland. As they progressed the canopy grew slowly less dense and narrow shafts of light began to sneak through the tree tops to the forest floor where they'd illuminate small piles of leaves that Aaron took great delight in charging through.

The clearing arrived quite suddenly on the pair as the tree line suddenly died back to reveal an area free of trees and dominated almost exclusively by grasses and small bushes. Around the edge of the clearing though the trees still stood at their full height and at the top were small dots of color. "Whimsy look! Up there!" Aaron exclaimed indicating towards the colorful pinpricks, "Are those berries? But how do we get to them?" In desperation Aaron did the only thing he knew how to do, he dropped his head and charged with an all out head smash attack which managed to shake a single item out of the gargantuan tree.

This dice is not existing.

(Okay, so that means that it is in fact a pecha berry due to the rarity system, correct?)
Wooper, after being thouroughly doused, got the silliest idea to roll around and leaves to make them stick. Of course, he began to notice that these leaves were greener than the ones off in the dark. Wiping a few leaves from his eyes, he chuckled at the aron's sudden leaf charge into the illuminated area. Waddling after, Whimsy continually gawked. It was the grandest sight he'd ever seen, especially for a ground-and-water dwelling Pokemon.
"Those look awfully ripe! Maybe we can knock them down somehow?" Whimsy chimed. However, right as he said it, Aaron had rushed forward into the tree and knocked off a berry. "Whoa...I've never seen a berry so...pink!"

Lying face down on the ground after the impact Aaron pulled himself together a little bit, the charge hadn't hurt him but it had left him just a little bit dizzy. Staggering in place for a moment he eventually regained himself enough to examine his spoils. Oh a pecha berry! And... what... is that it! One berry! One lousy berry! That charge is enough to knock over trucks and all it got was a single berry? Concluding that the whole experience was far too much work to try continually he decided that f he was to try and get more berries he'd need to use his head in a somewhat less literal sense.

Huddling around their prize Aaron looked up at Whimsy, "It's a good one alright" Aaron replied to Whimsy with a dissapointed smile on his face, "but it's only one, how are we going to get the rest down and can you make a meal with just berries? I don't know much about cooking but don't we need some other things too?"

Well, he was certainly right. You can't make a meal out of what you don't have. "Maybe if we got more pecha berries, and other berries, maybe even seeds, I could actually make something! You want me to try this time? I know you're prob'ly stronger and all, but different tactics never hurt," Whimsy chimed. He carefully scooped up the berry on his tail and waddled over to a part off the trail so neither of them would crush it on accident. Whimsy waddled back to a different tree, and held his breath. With his cheeks puffed, he released a decent gush of water from his storage sacs inside his cheeks, trying to force something, anything, out of that stubborn tree.

This dice is not existing.

EDIT: Did the command wrong.

Aaron didn't see what landed, he was too distracted watching the spurt of water pouring from Whimsy's mouth and the subtle rainbows that were cast across the ground as the sunlight passed through the rogue water droplets. At least it was a somewhat smarter tactic than Aaron had chosen, even if it wasn't quite as strong it had the same effect. Suddenly snapped back to reality by the sound of a dull thud on grassland Aaron became very aware that something had indeed fallen out of the tree.

"That was so cool Whimsy, I can't do anything like that" Aaron stated somewhat glumly, "What'd you get out of the tree?"

Whimsy was dazed from his own blast quite a bit. After snapping back to reality, he stooped to get a look at his prize. "A...seed? It's kinda weird looking! All red and yellow..." Ouch! It was hot to the touch, too! "Blaze seed? Blare seed? No no, I think it's a...Blast Seed!" Whimsy chimed. "I could cook this with the pecha berry for a bit of spice!"
But, the fruits couldn't have been the only thing disturbed, right? Even for a relatively safe forest, something was bound to be living in either tree. It had just occurred to Whimsy.

"Yay! We did it Whimsy, we got into the forest and got our prize, we're practically adventurers now!" Aaron chimed almost oblivious to the scene developing behind him. Although the pecha berry had been placed safely out of harms way from the two young explorers the sweet smell of the fruit combined with the overly obvious disturbance the pair had been cooking up had lured in some unwanted attention. At first nothing could be heard except a gentle rustling that could easily have been mistaken for the wind moving through the tree tops but the meadow was all to isolated for the wind to create such a nose on the ground.

Aaron only became aware of the disturbance as the rustling developed into a loud crack of dead wood that broke his joyous concentration. "What was that?" He asked timidly as he glanced over towards the path where the berry sat, "It sounded like a stick breaking..."

This dice is not existing.

Whimsy's joy faded into dead fear. Surely a limb had only broken off of a tree. At least, this was plausible until an angry squeaking-bark was heard. The Wooper waddle back to Aaron's side, ready to either grab him and run(nudge him and waddle) or stand and fight. Leaping out from behind the tree was a furious Patrat, ready to give the intruding kids a good whomping. Nervously, he inhaled and puffed out his cheeks again. Boy, if only he grabbed that frying pan on the way into the forest.

"Oh no!" Squeeled Aron, "What do we do?" The Patrat was blocking the way they'd come into the forest, if they wanted to run then they'd have to go deeper in and risk circling back around but then they could encounter more dangerous pokemon and wind up getting lost. The only realistic option was to go back past the Patrat who was now sniffing up the berry... Aron's berry. "Hey!" He shouted without thinking and overcome with rage, "What are you doing, that's mine!" At that the Patrat looked up and started squealing rabidly at the pair, "Oops."

Somewhat innately Aron's shell started glistening a little more than usual as it hardened up in anticipation of the coming battle. "It's ok, keep the berry, I don't need it that much." Aron attempted to reason but the Patrat simply continued to scream at him until it broke out into a charge. "Ahhhh!" Aaron screamed as he darted to the side to avoid the now rabid Patrat and his armor grew ever harder still.