15: Umbreon

Loud knocking on the door broke my attention from the history book I was looking at. I had been attempting to better understand this world, seeing as I’m probably going to be here a while. And just like how the past is referenced often on earth, it surely will be on Pokèmar. Plus I’m genuinely curious. But that’s going to have to wait. I open the door to see Emolga, who looks like he had been sprinting the whole way here. Which would not be a surprise.

“What is it Emolga?” I ask.

“You… You know about… About that suspicious Pokemon.” He says between tired breaths. He now has my undivided attention.

“What about it?”

“They found him…. Unconscious, battered, and bloody. It looks like he’s been through a war.” Huh? Did someone hurt him? And why?

“Where is he now?”

“At Swanna’s Inn. Thunder and Dunsparce are already there.”

“Go get Virizion. I’ll head over as soon as possible.” His expression immediately turns sour at the mention of Virizion’s name. “Emolga… Just let it go! She’s trying to change!”

“She nearly got us all killed. Why should I forgive her?”

“Because it’s the right thing to do. Holding onto your resentment will only create problems in the future. Now please just go get her.”

“…fine…” Emolga grumpily leaves to inform Virizion. Now… Time to get to Post Town and introduce ourselves to our mystery guest.

Holy crap. When Emolga says he looked like he was in a war he literally meant he looks like he took a frag grenade at point blank range. The Pokemon in question is a quadruped. Looks like a dog or a fox. Maybe a mix of both. There are yellow rings on his body that give off a faint glow. The bed he was lying on is stained red with blood. As is his jet black fur. His form is covered with cuts of various sizes. And there’s one long, deep laceration that runs across his shoulder. Needless to say, he’s hurt. Bad. And, of course, being the squeamish type, I start feeling nauseous. I was never good around wounds and blood. Except my own of course. Now I’m trying to keep breakfast in my stomach where it belongs rather than spewing it everywhere.

“I… I keep telling… You! I-I-I mean… No harm!” The wounded creature manages to say. Apparently Gurrdur’s days as an outlaw made him a bit more… Aggressive… When it comes to questioning. Why he’s even interrogating him would be the better question.

“So you say. But you’ve been spying on us for days now. Probably pegged us as an easy target for your underground team of yours. So tell me. Who are they?!”

“I just… Told you! There’s… No one but… My missing sister! I’m not-“

“Umbreon?!” Virizion’s voice rings out from the doorway. “Oh Arceus… What happened to you?!”

“Virizion?!” Umbreon says shocked. “What are… you doing here? And… Where’s Ke-“

“Stop. I’d rather not talk about him. At least… Not in public. But as for what I’m doing here, I joined up with these guys. Alex, Thunder, Emolga, and Dunsparce. We call ourselves Team New Hope.”

“You know him, Virizion?” I ask.

“Yeah. This is Umbreon. He and his sister Espeon are dungeon researchers. We met some time ago.”

“Oh… So you’re a friend of Virizion?” Gurrdur says. “…my apologies… I… Was a bit harsh.”

“Don’t worry.” Umbreon responds. “No hard feelings. But… I need to find Espeon before they do…”

“Not like this you can’t!” Virizion says. “You’ve lost a lot of blood. You’re in no condition to go anywhere!”

“I can’t just abandon my sister! She- Ow!” Umbreon tries to get up, but only succeeds in putting himself in more pain.

“Umbreon! Stop! Don’t stress yourself. You’re only making it worse.”

“Umbreon,” Thunder interrupts. “I promise that we will help look for your sister. Right, Alex?”

“Of course we’ll help. Isn’t that what we’re here for?” I respond.

“Thank you… That means a lot to me.” Umbreon says. “Now… I’m quite tired. I need some rest…”

“Yeah…” Virizion agrees. “We hope you get better soon.

“Right.” I say as we exit the room. “Ok, everyone. Let’s see if we can’t find any leads. Hopefully we can find her soon.”

For some reason this Umbreon and Espeon duo intrigues me. Umbreon’s resting and recovering from whatever happened to him so I can’t ask him about what. But I can  ask Virizion.

“Virizion? I’m curious. What exactly do Umbreon and Espeon do?”

“Well, they research mystery dungeons. Their job is to learn why they behave the way they do.”

“Sounds an awful lot like science. I’m a fan of science.”

“Then you’ll probably get along well with Espeon. She’s the brain of the duo. Umbreon’s the builder. He can create some pretty incredible things if given the time and resources needed. Last I saw them, they were working on this project together. A big project. Something revolutionary. It appears that they attracted the wrong type of attention, though,”

“So… Robbers looking to sell the research on the black market?”

“That’s the most likely explanation I can think of. I don’t exactly remember what it was they were working on but I remember that ke- …er… I was impressed by what they had come up with.” As much as Virizion didn’t want it, we all could tell she was hiding something. And while most of us decided to respectively drop it, Emolga didn’t.

“There was someone else with you, wasn’t there? A boyfriend?”

“Emolga…” I warn.

“No! I… I don’t want to talk about it.” Virizion replies.

“Aw… He broke your heart, didn’t he?” Emolga mocks. “He decided to get in bed with someone else?”

“Emolga…”

“N-no! We didn’t ha-“

“Or, more likely, you dumped him because he couldn’t do it for you! He wasn’t able to sate your-“

“Emolga! Enough! You’ve taken it too far!” I finally shut him up. Making assumptions like that about someone’s love life and mocking them about it is where I draw the line. “You need to stop this! It’s setting a poor example for the team!”

“Ugh… Fine…” He stops his little mocking session. For now, at least. Now that Emolga has some serious ammo to throw at her, things are probably going to heat up between them. But, of course, Emolga couldn’t resist one last insult. “You’re a dirty, filthy-“

“Emolga, I better not hear you finish that sentence…”